Sarah Fejfar (02:47)
Anthony, welcome to Greenroom Central Studios. Say hello to Linchpin Nation.
Anthony Trucks (02:54)
Hello, Linchpin Nation. My name is Anthony Trucks. I'm excited to serve you guys today.
Sarah Fejfar (03:13)
Oh, I'm so thrilled to have you. I've been really looking forward to this conversation, kind of like kid in a candy store. I have so many questions for you. I don't know if we'll have time to get all through all of them. But, you know, I think I found you through a common mentor, Brendan Brichard. In fact, I think the very first event I went to with him, you were on that stage. And, you know, but as I dove deeper to research for this,
Anthony Trucks (03:23)
I'm gonna let him in. Alright.
Sarah Fejfar (03:43)
episode, you know, I'm learning about how many commonalities we have to each other, you know, both being parents and entrepreneurs. And I think we're both dog parents, too. And, you know, it's just like this passion for excellence that I see in you. And it's just one of my highest values. So anyway, so excited. I thought I'd start by asking you a kind of a fun question. Tell have you tell us a story. So
Anthony Trucks (03:52)
Yeah.
Yeah. Alright.
Sarah Fejfar (04:10)
This podcast is based on the belief that being in the room is everything. And a little backstory for you, about six years ago, I made my way into my very first personal development seminar. Four days happen to be a Brenda Richard seminar. And within 11 months of being in that room, I had left the Midwest where I'd been my entire life, moved myself to the Pacific Northwest, sold our house.
Anthony Trucks (04:21)
Okay.
Sarah Fejfar (04:36)
I left a 16-year corporate career and started my own business, got out of a decade and a half of debt I'd been under. It's just like a massive shift. And to start us off today, I'm wondering if you would share a story of a room that you made it into that changed your life.
Anthony Trucks (04:44)
Over and over. Yeah.
Oh man, there's a bunch of rooms I made it into. Well, I did start in a Brett and Rashard room. It's interesting. I think I might be one of the few people, whoever was like an audience member who became like a, like a part of his mastermind. Like I'm a buddy, a buddy. I might catch you in my text right now. Like what's going on, you know? But here's what it was. I have always been in a position where I was like giving away as a kid, didn't have much. That's a lot of stories. I think one that would probably relate to the entrepreneurial world is the one you're talking to. I got done with the NFL, came home.
Sarah Fejfar (04:58)
Oh really?
Anthony Trucks (05:19)
had a gym that I ran, you know, degree in kinesiology, novel idea for an athlete, you know, going to fitness. And then, and then I got to my position of like, you know, kind of building in the night, I got introduced to this guy named Jadon Cherry. Jadon's a guy that opened or runs a company called Fire Alumni. What they do is they train firefighters to go out into the world and be better. And part of the thing they do is called the C-Best. So when I was in fitness, I was teaching the firefighter how to get in better shape to do their thing. He goes, Hey, what we're going to do is we're going to go ahead and record these videos.
Sarah Fejfar (05:24)
Right? Yeah, yeah.
Oh cool.
Anthony Trucks (05:47)
We're going to put them online and allow people to pay us money to access them. And I go, that's blasphemy. What are you talking about? Everything's going to be in person. That's how fitness works. He goes, no, this guy, Brendan Bichard, in fact, he does this. I'm going to give you a link to go. Right. So I get this link and I open it up and I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Brentwood, California there. It was like, you know, 10 in the morning. I'm watching this guy, Brendan, in front of a flip chart with little sticky notes, flipping papers and writing. He's so energetic and talking and I'm like, I got to do this. You know, and he goes.
Sarah Fejfar (05:50)
Okay.
Yeah, yeah.
Anthony Trucks (06:12)
Your story is a thing you can actually make a living off of if you do it properly. You teach from it. I go great. Called Experts Academy. So I found myself maybe two months later at an event because it happened to be in Santa Clara, California, about an hour and a half north or south of me. So I drive down, I walk into this room and it's two thousand people and everybody's clapping hands and they're hanging out. I'm like, this is weird. This is not a football guy. We don't like jump and high five and tell our life stories.
Sarah Fejfar (06:33)
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (06:38)
And so I'm doing this whole thing. And then, you know, sure enough, by like day two, I'm clapping, I'm jumping, I'm having fun. You know, you're all engaged in it. It opens this idea. And the idea is like, maybe there's more to life. Maybe there's maybe there's something you can do that you haven't done or you're supposed to do you haven't been doing. And I remember I got to the back of this room and there's like a spot where they put you together, goes, hey, three or five people, you know, get in a group and answer this question, this question, this question. He's really big on doing this. I go, OK, we get a little group. We talk.
Sarah Fejfar (06:43)
Yep.
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (07:05)
Unbeknownst to me, one of the people in the group was some of the people that were part of the staff. They just happened to hear my story. One of them tells somebody else and, you know, telephone effect happens. And next thing I'm standing in front of one of the people, they go, tell me your story. Tell them my story. And they go, that's great. And then they just kind of let me go. So I went to like three or four more events. And at one point in time, they go, hey, would you like to volunteer? I'd love to volunteer. Now, I come from the NFL, meaning I've been around big names. I mean, I don't really not that I don't care that they're a big name, but I don't have this like, oh, my gosh, it's so and so, you know.
I go there a human like it's cool. So I had no intention of meeting him. That wasn't a design. I was like, I wanted to be just there. I didn't meet him for probably a couple of events to be quite honest. Like I was just volunteering in the front and I never even talked to him. But at one point there's a spot where Mel Abraham who's like his right-hand guy. He had to go to do something for his business. And he goes, hey, do you mind being Brennan's escort? Cause you kind of look like security. I go, all right. And I felt like, that makes sense.
Sarah Fejfar (07:34)
Yes.
Mm.
Really?
Yeah.
Hahaha!
Anthony Trucks (07:58)
So, yeah, so, you know, next thing I'm walking Brendan back and he asks, hey, what's your store? And I kind of get a little chat with him for like maybe five minutes while we're walking. And little by little, I get to a point where eventually, like I'm volunteering every event, you know, I'm kind of with him and hanging out with the rest of the crew. We're just talking and he finds out that I did this fitness stuff or did he wanted to put this product together for people. He's like, let's do it together. So I find myself in Portland, Oregon, you know, at a tea shop with him, you know, creating this whole amazing idea, shooting it. I want to say a couple of days later, shooting the whole thing.
Sarah Fejfar (08:25)
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (08:28)
And essentially me going into a room of 2,000 people put me in a position where, I want to say, it might have been two years later, maybe three years max later, I'm on his stage in front of 2,000 people at High Performance Academy in 2016, just for the first time speaking in front of a group that large. And it all happened because I simply showed up to that room. I could have got a ticket when I was in Brentwood and not gone. I could have just did a course online and not shown up.
But me showing up, put me in a position where I sat, put me in position, who heard me, put me in position. Like these little things that stacked it over, but the showing up and being present quite literally was the Linchpin to me being here now.
Sarah Fejfar (09:06)
Yeah, yeah. I feel like my story is so similar because I was just like started with one of those black and white YouTubes and ended up a year later, like I have no idea why this is happening, but I need to be in this room. And it was a 2017 fall, like HPA. And I was like, it blew my mind open because I had up until that moment only been producing events where people had to, we paid their way.
Anthony Trucks (09:13)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Sarah Fejfar (09:34)
they had to be there and they didn't want to be there. And I'm sitting in the exact opposite style of room and just mind blown. And that was the seed that got planted where I was like, oh my gosh, it took me a full year to realize like that's the space I'm supposed to be serving because I'm next to people who are like, oh, I want to do this too. But I'm scared or I don't know how. And I'm just sitting there thinking like, well, I know how and this is like my favorite thing to do. And I know how the wizard behind the curtain works.
Anthony Trucks (09:37)
Hmm.
Sarah Fejfar (10:03)
But it took me a minute to put it together. But then, yeah, at that event, I learned about Experts Academy and went the next month. And at that event, I learned about the world's greatest speaker, went to that, brought my husband to the next HBA. It's like, yeah, it did. It was just life changing.
Anthony Trucks (10:14)
And it just goes and goes and goes, yeah.
Yeah, that's how it works. Here's what I would say though. It's life changing because you did something with what you learned, because I will say this, and you could probably attest to this, 2,000 plus people in the room, majority of people will go take notes and never open the notebook again, never act on it again. They'll go to the same event year after year after year. I actually remember being at the first one and I was walking to lunch in Santa Clara and you go across the street to the Barberito Zilla and I was by myself, I just went by myself. I remember overhearing somebody go,
Sarah Fejfar (10:27)
Oh.
Anthony Trucks (10:50)
And my head goes, it's an educational event. What do you need to learn in seven different times you haven't already learned by taking action on it? And I'm just built differently because I'm like, I heard it. I'm doing it. So like I started doing a video a day. I did one thousand three hundred and thirty three straight days of video, a 90 second video posting it every single day, three point six five years. And that's one of the reasons I think also they asked me to show up because they were seeing me do the work. If I was a guy showing up and clapping hands.
Sarah Fejfar (10:59)
Yeah.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (11:19)
I would have never asked to be to be volunteer, like to actually show up and serve. I would have never asked me. They would have put me in a position to be a representative of his brand because I wasn't doing the work. Right. So the big thing is, wow, yes, it's good to be there. And yet you have to realize that you being there is just a way for you to get access to information and an experience other people won't have. But then act on it. And so many people don't, unfortunately.
Sarah Fejfar (11:24)
100%.
And I think because I'm a doer, like my superpowers like that I keep going like I'm like you, I'm like an implementer. I make stuff happen. I just do the work. And I it took me a while to realize wait, like, actually, not everyone in here is doing the thing that he says you have to go do. And it really was like, it really broke my brain.
Anthony Trucks (11:47)
It's working.
Oh, no. Maybe one percent. Yeah, like one percent. That's why they call it the one percenters. The one to three percent of people. That's... There are a lot of things. I had a conversation about this recently. You know, I haven't played the NFL where less than a half a percent of people will get a chance to go play ever in the world. When I trickle it back, and you hear this all the time, some of the best players never played the game. Right? Some of the best athletes, some of the... they never actually got on the football field because they couldn't take care of the training or the recovery or the grades.
Sarah Fejfar (12:16)
Mm.
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (12:29)
or they didn't listen to coaching, right? All these different nuanced pieces. And so people look at it and they go, oh, well, it's because they were 1% and 1% athlete. No, no, no. It's because they chose to be 1% everywhere, not 1% in one place. And so I look at the NFL and I played there, and I know, like I look at people and go, I could tell it, like I had a kid that recently got drafted in the second round that I used to train at my gym. When he was eight years old, I told his dad, this kid's gonna probably play in the NFL.
You may ask why because I remember sitting there watching him in a room of 60 people at eight years old youngest in the room with all these high school kids that were complaining and doing their stuff and falling out. When we're doing these plank holds, the kid would hold it. He would cry because of the pain, but he was never gonna let himself break. And I looked at him, I go, this kid's different. He not only is he a guy that can play the game, but he is he prepares differently. He's eight doing this, right? That's a mentality that people don't have. So becoming a 1% isn't just do you have a sedate skill set.
it's do you have the 1% effort? And that's the limiting factor. And you can work into it. But it's like you look and go, oh, 1%? That just means that 99% of people weren't willing to give. They were capable of giving, but a lot of them just weren't willing to give. Now, yes, some aren't the athletes. Some don't have the skill sets. But I think if you can get to that point of the 1% effort, it becomes less of a, like, you know, 99 to 1, and more like a 50-50 or even better, because so few people will give that 1% effort.
Sarah Fejfar (13:39)
Yeah.
Hmm. My kiddo, they just started dryland practice in addition to being in the pool. And one of the first activities this week was doing wall sits. And it was like, well, just like last person to be on the wall gets to pick the game at the end of practice. And she wouldn't give up. Even when they said, okay, like, we're going to be done because like there's too many people still on the wall. She waited in
Anthony Trucks (13:57)
something. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Sarah Fejfar (14:19)
till everyone else got off and I was like, I was so proud in that moment.
Anthony Trucks (14:20)
Everybody got on. Hell yeah. I would be too. I'm like, I'm quite like, hell yeah. Get it. I might not be part about it. I might actually say something out loud. There's something to that. And that's you can't teach that, man, especially at a young age. You can't when you get older, you can become presently aware of it. And then people that get to worlds where they're like, I don't like being here. And the hard part is, is if they really were to own up to it, they go, well, it's my fault. I cut the corner. I watch too much TV. I didn't take care of my body.
Sarah Fejfar (14:27)
Hahaha!
Huh?
Mm.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Anthony Trucks (14:48)
I didn't have the hard conversations. I didn't send those emails out when I was supposed to. And then they go, all my business is failing. No, you failed the business. Because with the right plan, I don't know anybody that fails when they have the right plan and they work it. Even a crappy plan, but if you work, the plan will make itself right because you're not gonna work for nothing. But most people fail the plan before the plan fails them.
Sarah Fejfar (14:54)
Mmm.
Oh, so good. I want to stay in the vein of events for a little bit. It's my favorite thing. I'm always so in awe. What did you say?
Anthony Trucks (15:14)
do it. I'm sorry if I'm doing like a tangent. I do this. I start talking sometimes. I'm like, I know you have questions and I realize you have questions. So I'm gonna stop going long winded. My apologies here.
Sarah Fejfar (15:24)
I know I have so many I'm excited to get to. Okay, so I'm always so in awe and full of honor and deep appreciation for really good speakers. And that's you in my book because I've seen a lot, you know, as a person who's produced events for over 20 years now, I know what it's like to move an audience and to kick off transformation inside of a room. And you do that as part of your everyday work, speaking on stages. And I...
Anthony Trucks (15:33)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Fejfar (15:49)
wonder if you'd share what you're most grateful for as you step off the stages that you speak and like what talks at your heartstrings and you know I'm guessing there's you know you've done so many and there's probably still a spark that you know you're like I want to go home and tell my wife Christina about this or my kids like what is it?
Anthony Trucks (15:59)
Hmm. Yeah. Always.
Yeah, you know, it's interesting. So it's going to sound odd, but I am happy with the moment that I may never be part of or present or privy to. That will happen years down the road. And it sounds weird to say this way, but like when I come home, my wife and kids don't always ask, like, how was the speech? How was work, Dad? Because I don't bring it home like that. I'm not like, hey, guys, I'm amazing. I was on the stage. I'm so great. You know, I'll show them some clips. And it's like, it's pretty cool. But I'm just Dad, man. It's like, Dad, can you fix this? This is broken.
Sarah Fejfar (16:26)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (16:38)
hey honey, can you take the laundry, switch the laundry? Like, I'm a dad, I'm really a regular human, right? And so for me, it's like, I love that I get to go up there and I get to pour out, and here's why. Because there'll be, I guess, one big moment, but there's two together. One moment is gonna be one where I am fulfilled. I love that I get to go and serve people and I feel like I'm doing something I'm purpose-driven to do. That's a gift that I think you have to earn. And I work my tail off to get to the point of feeling like I'm heavily in purpose for my life.
and of purpose for the world. So it's a first piece. So when I come, I leave the stage fulfilled and happy that people enjoyed it. And I get to go home light. Like I don't come home heavy or argumentative. So when I'm home and I'm happy and I'm light, my life is happy. I think the world's a reflection to us. If I give that out, I get it back. So my house is happy. My house is peaceful. We have joy in our home. It's because of how I get to go and fulfill and create. The other part is there's going to be moments in time in the future where
Sarah Fejfar (17:16)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (17:34)
I believe my wife and kids will run into some people that have a conversation about me. And I'll be a thing, go that someone goes that was your dad? That's a great guy. Like he did this for me and nobody ever knew like those kind of things. And so like those are the moments that I live towards. I don't ever be present in them, but I know they'll exist in some manner or at least my heart believes they'll exist. Right. And so for me, when I'm doing my thing, what I'm most grateful for quite literally is the fact that I get to do something that fulfills me enough to go home and like pour out.
Sarah Fejfar (17:41)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (18:02)
So I get, I get filled up as I pour out and that in the future, I'll be some of my, my family can be proud to say as my husband or my dad.
Sarah Fejfar (18:09)
Mm hmm. Well, you said something about joy there, and I sense that in you, like when you are on stage, I like your smile lights up your eyes and it lights up the room. And I sense that that's kind of how you live your life, you know, from watching your Instagram stories. Like, that's just who you are. How do you generate that?
Anthony Trucks (18:25)
Yeah.
Oh man, I am very, very presently aware of where I could be. It's a constant gratitude. Like, and it's not that I go like, it's just like there's gratitude practices and I do believe you should do some. For me, it's an everyday thing. Toward the practices is just my instinctual identity now. Meaning I know what happens to foster kids like myself. I was in the system for 11 years. And if you go to any prison in America, 75% of the inmates are former foster kids. 1% of us will graduate from college. We're not really given...
Sarah Fejfar (18:34)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (18:58)
much odds to do well. It's just statistically not how it works. And so I am really aware of what my life could be and it's not. I'm aware I could be in prison, I could be a bad father, I could be a horrible husband, I could be a criminal. Like I know these things. And so because of the fact that I get to step into rooms, like I was just on a stage in front of 10,000 people for an event, I'm on a flight to London to go work with Amazon. Like these things that I get to do that are so far outside of the norm for almost anybody, let alone this lowly foster kid, that gives me a sense of
Sarah Fejfar (19:04)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (19:27)
galley even the bad days are great days. You know, like it's, it's just bad compared to how I feel on a regular basis. But even that gives me like, are you know, salt makes things sweeter. Like I'm just I'm more appreciative for my days and what I do have because they don't last forever. It's not like it's the end of the world for me. It's like, oh, this got messed up. Like this morning, we got some people doing work at the house and they've been in my like five days very frustrating, right? But I'm like, at least I have a home that's warm. And at least have a wife that understands at least have the excess income to create this cool space for myself, my family.
Sarah Fejfar (19:30)
Yeah.
Mm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Right.
Anthony Trucks (19:57)
So those things are always like, I'm always in a joyful place. I don't, I don't, I think it would be disrespectful to my God and to my family and to my mom to not have joy for the things I do have. So when you see me on stage, I'm an, I'm light, man. I'm just, I'm letting Anthony out of the bottle. There's, there's nothing I'm not cultivating and creating it. It's just like, all right, let's go. So I get to be fully me on a stage and share and talk and jump around. And, you know, so that's the, that's like a happy place for me. So what you're seeing genuinely when you're watching me.
Sarah Fejfar (20:09)
Mm.
Hmm, yeah.
Anthony Trucks (20:28)
is a man in real time presently connected to his gratitude and also to having a space to give that to the audience as best I can.
Sarah Fejfar (20:35)
Mm, that's so beautiful. I was listening to your podcast episode this morning about honor and pride and taking pride in what you do. And I really resonate with that. I think, you know, and then I was also reading the reviews of you speaking on stages on your website and the specificity with which people explained how you delivered with excellence for their audience. Really touched me because I've hired so many speakers and I know
Anthony Trucks (20:42)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Fejfar (21:05)
what it looks like. I know the full spectrum of what it looks like to show up and serve. And I appreciate that. And so your episode made me think of two things. First, one of my very favorite books is Excellence Wins by Horace Schultz. And he, I believe, was the co-founder and the CEO of Ritz Carlton. And then it also makes me think about a story that I tell my students, which is around that concept of taking pride in excellence.
Anthony Trucks (21:07)
Yeah.
Sarah Fejfar (21:34)
when you're building your own event, which is like kind of that live embodiment of your brand is like, you know, I sit in a coffee shop sometimes and I watch the people like come around and clean the tables and some of them will just like clean where there's crumbs or spills and then some will clean the whole flipping table. And I'm like, be the person who cleans the whole flipping table, you know? Exactly, and so it makes me wanna ask you, like, why do you think
Anthony Trucks (21:50)
Okay. Mm-hmm.
Yeah, if you're gonna touch it, make it amazing.
Sarah Fejfar (22:03)
It is that you take pride in your work and really believe in doing things with excellence.
Anthony Trucks (22:10)
And it's nothing to do with anybody else, to be honest. It has a hundred percent to do with me. That there, if you had listened to the episodes recently, I had this discussion and discussions pop up in weird ways for me. But it did piggybacks off this thought that the reason I don't cheat on my wife isn't just because I love my wife. It sounds odd to say it like this. That's a weird direction to go, I know. But one of the greater reasons, like I obviously I love my wife. It's one of the big reasons. We'll call it like, you know, we'll call it 50%. The other 50% is
Sarah Fejfar (22:14)
Mm.
Mm.
Yep. Ha ha.
Anthony Trucks (22:39)
I don't want to not love me. And if I did that to someone I loved, I wouldn't love me. So I'll heavily like it's because I love my wife, right? The big piece of it is I love me more than, more than I probably should in a sense, in an aspect of like, I want to be of integrity. So when I go to bed, I know my heart, I trust me, I love me. I don't like doing things that diminish a sense of self for me. And so I say that to go like the, when I go and show up to certain places, I know what I have to give.
Sarah Fejfar (22:41)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (23:06)
And so I give all that I have to give. The cool thing is the audience benefits, right? Because they're seeing everything that I have to give. And I'm doing it because I know I have to give that. This is perfect because today I got an email. Because I get emails every day, it seems like we're about speeches, right? And our typical fee right now is 25,000 a keynote plus 2,500 for travel. So whenever I go out, that's what it is. Now I worked with a company last year that asked me to come out, paid my fee no problem. Then somebody else...
Sarah Fejfar (23:26)
Okay.
Anthony Trucks (23:34)
tied to the event reached out this morning goes hey can you come out to our event we don't have very much now I only take fee drops really to a high level as if I'm doing at risk youth and foster kids this group says hey I only have 10,000 plus travel to give and I go I'd love to I'd love to diminish it but here's the thing one I have to keep the integrity meaning I don't want it all of a sudden have someone pay 25 and then you pay 10 it's just not good it's just not how I feel of integrity for the industry but then too I said I don't do anything less than my absolute best.
Sarah Fejfar (23:43)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (24:03)
and I have to feel like I'm reciprocated for the absolute best I give. Even if I take a 5,000 or a 7,000, if I agree to this, you're gonna get $30,000 in value from me. It's just gonna happen. It's how I'm gonna show up. So I have to make sure I'm doing that at full integrity. And so it's not about them, it's not even about the money. It's just knowing that if I'm going to express, it's gonna be the absolute best I have. And then in that process, it benefits the world because nobody gets anything less from me, no matter where I go, how I walk, how I function. So it's not predicated on
Sarah Fejfar (24:05)
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (24:32)
if I respect you or you have a high title or you've done some good things for me, you don't matter in this case. If I agree to do it, it's going to be the best. And then guess what? Everybody gets to feel that. It's actually, I think all businesses live and die in the dark. Conversations had about you and nobody's present. So yeah, you might have this person that's a high title and you go and serve them. And then you go and serve somebody else a little bit less than because they're less than well, they know each other and you don't know that. And this company was thinking about having somebody else that came along the lines go, Hey,
looking for somebody and you could have been that person I talked about, but you weren't because they heard from their buddy how you served them better and you didn't do it for them and you're spiteful so you don't say my name. I never know about it. Right? So this idea of integrity and honoring things, anything you touch, you touch it with the mentality of it will be the absolute best I ever do, but not for other people because it's who you are to do it.
Sarah Fejfar (25:04)
Yeah.
Oh, it gives me chills. That's so good. It makes me want to ask about that. Without the wanting to honor yourself peace and believing in yourself peace I so I've been working with my therapist over the past like over a year now about working on identity work and amongst other things and kind of doing my own identity shift.
Anthony Trucks (25:44)
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Fejfar (25:51)
if you will. And, you know, you're so experienced in that and you coach in that. And I think it's obviously one of the best, I call business decisions I've ever made to start doing the work on myself. And that sounds so silly, because, you know, in the past, me would say like, that's personal. And this is business, but it's they're actually so connected, right?
Anthony Trucks (26:06)
Mm-hmm. No, it's not at all. It's 100% necessary.
You know.
Yes, it's all humanity.
Sarah Fejfar (26:16)
And we've been getting into inner child work and recognizing where there's responses that I have to certain situations that are really from a different time in my life, when things were different or traumatic or harder. And I know that you've had quite a difficult childhood. And I wonder if it's part of the shift work that you do with your clients, that inner child stuff. And is that something you help people work through as a coach and if so, how?
Anthony Trucks (26:29)
I've been there.
I don't go too far back like therapy aspects of the child, but here's what I will say, all of us have ways of being programmed. And I agree, you cannot attain or sustain any goal or any vision in life above your current identity. So if there's things that you do that hinder a goal, it is part of you and you just keep that there. You don't get that thing. If you can make shifts, you get that thing. And so the bigger piece to it for me is this reality of you have to understand that
Sarah Fejfar (26:49)
Yes.
Mm-hmm. Yep.
Anthony Trucks (27:08)
The child of you was programmed in a certain way. And as you grow, you do become more maturely aware of things you're doing. When you become maturely aware of things you're doing, what happens is you have a choice you have to make. The choice is option A. You go, oh, it's just who I am. Accept me as I am. And in that, you have some frustration with the person you're talking to. You're limited on some success you can have. All those things are part of it. Or you maturely go, yeah, that part of me sucks. I got to stop doing that. And then you have to find out what actions over time can put you in the opposite of it.
Sarah Fejfar (27:14)
Yes.
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (27:37)
And it's going to be an ego hit. You're going to have to suck up your pride, and then that ego's going to have to take a little bit of a death there. But in doing this, you are able to build into the new direction of who you are. So for me as a kid, I didn't trust people. I mean, for obvious reason. My mom gave me away. I was beaten by these families. I didn't trust adults. They all lied. It was horrible. These different people that just... So I had this wall. And so for me, for a lot of years, I was like, nobody can come in. All people are bad. Nobody can come in, you know? And honestly...
Sarah Fejfar (27:42)
Mm.
Yeah?
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (28:06)
I also had issues of like taking appreciation, like people saying thank you. I couldn't take a thank you till I was in my early 30s, it was weird. And so the reality is I had to sit there and go, why am I doing this? Like, and you start thinking about it, yeah, I was a kid this happened, I had a little bit of an anger, some trust issues there. And then, you know, there's these thank you things, like when they say it, I just, oh yeah, no big deal, I push it away, you know, as opposed to receiving it in. I had to sit with that and go, well, when I don't let people in, I keep out the good with the bad.
Sarah Fejfar (28:10)
Mm.
Wow.
Anthony Trucks (28:35)
So I'm locking myself away from greatness there. And then also I don't say thank you. Well, people don't get the feeling of positivity from saying thank you, so they stop saying it. And so I'm angry that they're not saying thank you, but they can't say it because they don't feel reciprocated. It's the weird dynamic of a dance, of a relationship there. But I as an adult and maturely can go, I don't want that to be part of me anymore. So now what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna trust you until you give me a reason not to. Now, if you break my trust, you're gone quickly and never coming back. But I'll let you know that. And then two, when you say thank you, I'm gonna say thank you, I received that. I appreciate that.
Sarah Fejfar (28:47)
Yeah.
Mm.
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (29:05)
And I had to, and it felt awkward out of, it felt out of character. It was not who I was to do, it was just, all right. But the more you do it, over time, I call it the dark work. It's the stuff that you do that's uncomfortable. That's not sexy. And nobody even knows what's going on sometimes. It's not getting cheers in the background, but little by little, it now becomes who you are to do that. So you reprogram from the previous programming.
Sarah Fejfar (29:28)
Mm.
What would you say is like the piece of doing that dark work that's mattered the most in you? Is this something I struggle with, the honoring that I have worth and respecting myself?
Anthony Trucks (29:44)
Yeah. Oh, yeah. So that's one that's it is a little bit interesting. So the way that I would express it is. It's kind of like this. You don't look at professional athletes. And when I look at them and I go, man, these people are coming out with all this dog in this fight, this deal, Tom Brady, the people that have like this animalistic feel to them. And so what I notice is that they work themselves into a space where they don't go out to the field and go, I don't know if I can do this.
Sarah Fejfar (30:02)
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (30:14)
I don't know if I'm capable. And so what I've noticed is individuals who have this sense of fight in the moments that you fight, what they're actually doing is they're drawing on a dark energy that they built up by doing the most ridiculous, hard, difficult things you can imagine. I think there's a purity to our invested biases, humans that we don't tap into. So when you say I show up and I've had this, I showed up, I wasn't confident in myself as a speaker. I'm a former NFL athlete, I'm a dumb jock. Who am I to go teach people from a stage? This is really my mentality.
Sarah Fejfar (30:33)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (30:44)
And I go, what do people who are great speakers do? And I go, well, they practice their craft, they hone their craft, they build into it, they create content, they're just doing these things. And I go, I've never done it before. It's not who I am to do this. You know, I don't know if I want to. So I realized that I need to do things in action with what I'd already done for football. Here's what I noticed for football. I wasn't a good football player at first, but I had to start by doing route running and catching footballs and lifting weights and doing these things that I wasn't normally used to doing. So little by little, I'm building into it. And I went from being like sucky to this phenomenal athlete, not even...
Just great, but like this pure confidence, borderline arrogance of how good I could be on a football field. And sure enough, the flow comes, and I'm great at this thing, I get to play the highest level in the world, but it started by me not feeling worthy or confident in this area. Same for business. So when you ask what's the thing you have to do, we have to be open to the idea that our hard is far below our dreams level of hard. Meaning we have a version of what's hard to us, and I go, I can't do anymore. I'm so tired, this is too difficult, right?
Sarah Fejfar (31:43)
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (31:44)
And we will accept that in the moment. But the reality is, is if your dream is at a higher level, you have to climb with effort beyond that. And when you do it, two things happen. One, you oddly develop the skill that you need to have confidence around deploying because you have that skill. But secondly, you've invested beyond a level of comfort that in talking like it was icky, it felt like, it was so hard. Because of that investment, you will not have a return. You will not let it go to waste.
Sarah Fejfar (32:10)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (32:12)
So for us, our big brand language is, I want you to show up to defining moments with the mentality of, I have done too much work in the dark to lose in the light.
Sarah Fejfar (32:21)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (32:22)
And that's that tide of the athletes I was talking about. When they show up, they have done more things than anyone's ever seen them do. It's not just the workouts for two hours. It's when they go to bed, when they wake up, their meditation, the food they eat, the food that they didn't eat, the relationships they had hard conversations with, the things they weren't settling for. These things they did when they get to that game day, it's like, it's not a, can I do this? I don't know if I'm, they're like, let me loose. It's my time. Like there's a, I...
Sarah Fejfar (32:25)
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (32:51)
take the chains off and ready to rock and rock, there's a different energy. And the only reason they have that is because of what they did when no one saw. And so all of us have, again, that 1% effort opportunity, but few of us get to that point. We may give that 90th percentile energy, and that's pretty good still, 95. But when you give that 1%, you know you gave 1%. And you will fight different. You will battle different. You will show up different. And on top of that, because you gave the effort, you also have this confidence and the skill you developed.
Sarah Fejfar (32:51)
Yes.
Mmm.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (33:20)
It's a magical, powerful place that anybody can access, but 1% do. And so for me, when I talk about this dark work stuff, there's a lot that goes into it. How you actually clarify what it is you want to go after, I call it respect and the light. How you actually design your dark work because you can't just emotionally do it. It's got to be a plan. Then how do you actually step into the next stage and emerge into it? But the big critical piece of that is realizing that when you get to those moments where you're at that point of I don't want to move, fitness is a good way to show it because you can put yourself emotionally and physically there.
Sarah Fejfar (33:37)
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (33:49)
There's a moment in time when we're doing a workout and we can't breathe, our muscles are sore, and we have five more sets or five more reps, whatever it is, and I go, I can't do it. In your head, you can't do it. And here's the cool thing, that's a beautiful gift of a moment. Because in this moment, I have hit my peak, which means that any movement I do beyond this, I know I'm getting better. 99% of people will stop because no one's gonna know but them, and they stop. The 1% of people lean in because they know that no one will know but them.
Sarah Fejfar (34:02)
Mmm.
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (34:19)
And when they do it at that level, now you have this better ability physically, and your mind is different. That means when you show up in the world, your confidence is different. Your head's held higher. You got a different swag to you. You stack that for day after day. You've got that for years. You got animals that go out into the world and they get what they want. Not off of luck, but off of that's who their identity is now.
Sarah Fejfar (34:25)
Yeah.
so good. I had a moment, I did a 30 day juice fast last year and then I've been really leaning into ice baths over the past few months and I just had this like click for me that the doing the hard things like prepare you for other hard things like you're just describing. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. It's like, yeah, it's fuel.
Anthony Trucks (34:52)
Mm-hmm.
Oh, heck yeah. Yeah. You borrow it and take it somewhere else. It's just, yeah.
Sarah Fejfar (35:11)
I mean this.
Anthony Trucks (35:11)
It is. That's why I get athletes that step into different stuff. And I just I tie it in because they are the ones that people predominantly know. But they'll try different. They'll try businesses, you know. And there's movie stars and business entrepreneurs that will try. Like, look at Mark Zuckerberg, wanted to pick up him and Elon Musk and go do, you know, jiu jitsu. It's like when you have this confidence in one area, you have a sense of self of an identity that goes, if I take this identity somewhere else, it will be successful because I know how to get there.
Sarah Fejfar (35:17)
Yeah.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (35:36)
And so you do need to bring it over, but you have to build it somewhere, right? So if you don't have a successful business, great. Maybe you don't identify with a successful business as the trait that makes you have confidence, but you identify with the fact that you've been able to take care of your body. Or every day for the last whatever, you know, three months you've done a cold bath. Like that's why people do these things. It's not just for the physical benefits. It's for the mind more than the body. Because when the mind is there, it'll drive the body when you can separate the two. Meaning, when your body is no longer controlling the situation, your mind is.
Sarah Fejfar (35:48)
Yes.
Yes.
Hmm. Nothing can stop you.
Anthony Trucks (36:05)
nothing gets in your way. Because typically you go, my body goes, it's cold, the mind goes, you're right body, let's not do it. When the body goes cold, the mind goes, I don't care, we're doing it. And you subject the body to it, you're now in control. And that's a different state of power.
Sarah Fejfar (36:11)
Yes.
Oh, that's so good, so good. I'm reading a book right now, 10X is easier than 2X.
Anthony Trucks (36:28)
I have that. I haven't read it, but I got it right over there, actually. Yeah. It's like an orange tin. Yeah, I'm looking right at it. It's the top book. I haven't opened it yet, though. I'm looking right at it.
Sarah Fejfar (36:30)
Oh my gosh, so good. Couldn't, can't recommend it higher enough.
I got the pleasure. I'm in Stu and Amy McLaren's book membership and they brought in the author last month, a few weeks ago. It was like the best zoom I've ever been on my whole life. Learning from him was just like mind blowing. But it's making me want to ask you the question about how do you win when you're playing your own game and making your own rules? Because now it's different. You're an entrepreneur, right?
Anthony Trucks (36:46)
Mm-hmm.
That's cool.
Oh, yeah, well, two things, because this is me, is how I operate and function to is I actually set up a structure to where I am not, I'm not going to be guided by my emotions, I cannot be because I am human and my feelings are the same as everybody else's feelings. And if I if I run off of my emotions, then what happens is
Sarah Fejfar (37:16)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (37:25)
I'm in a place where if I feel good, I do it. If I don't, I don't. And a business can't run like that. You can't have success. You can't make impact. You can't make income doing that. That's why I say design your dark. People try to stay disciplined to emotions, but emotions change, so your discipline will change. But if you have a plan and you're disciplined to a plan, the plan won't change. You may step back and change it, but the plan won't change. Which means you get up in the morning, it's like you have a boss. The boss is the schedule that old Anthony created. That plan, that's the boss today.
Sarah Fejfar (37:46)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (37:53)
That's what I'm listening to. I'm not negotiating with the boss. The boss said to do it. I'm doing it. Homie Bryant talks about this. I set a contract. Not negotiating the contract. Same exact logic, right? But then you also go, well, what if the plan isn't enough and I don't want to push myself? Here's a good thought of this. I actually am a guy who has a degree in kinesiology, owned a gym for a decade, trained pro bowlers. I do not write my own workouts.
Sarah Fejfar (37:57)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (38:16)
I know I'll make them easier, even I don't want to. It is hard to make a workout that I'm like, I'll do that, that's super hard. But if you give me one, if somebody who has a space of intelligence I trust, if they write it out, I won't even talk to them about trying to get it lesser. I will do everything they say. And I lock it and I do it. It's hard, I know it's gonna be hard, but for some reason I found that's a dance I don't do well. So I say that to go, when I get to my business, I have people that I talk to that will stretch me to be one inch out of my comfort zone.
I'll tell them what I want to do, but I'll have them review it and they go, that sounds good, but you put a hundred here. Why not a thousand? Oh, what do you mean? Yeah, you could do a thousand. What's this say? What you could do for a hundred. Once the system's running it, you can get to a thousand this year. You're right. Okay. Right. Or it's like, Hey, your fees this, why don't make it this? Well, I don't know. Hey, just what do you got to do to make it this? Okay. Right. These little things tie in. And so when I get to this point of being, I say one inch out of control or one inch out of comfort.
Sarah Fejfar (38:53)
Yes.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (39:12)
I will ask people to give me insights and I'm backtracking go, okay, now that's the situation, not negotiating it down. What do I have to do to create a plan to make that happen that I can be disciplined to? And now I get an emotion. And for me, it's not about the big hurrah. I tell people I don't even like saying the words, I'm gonna go big. I hate it. Because to go big means I'm gonna give one big, and then I'm done. The reality is I wanna learn to go really small in a humongous way. Because the small thing is what builds to the big thing.
Sarah Fejfar (39:40)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (39:40)
And most people want to have the big thing. And I go, no, the big thing's not going to happen. Or you're not going to maintain it. And so for me, I go, what's the goal to end destination? What's the small thing I have to implement in my day every day, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, maybe an hour a day? And some of them are harder. An hour a day is hard. But I'll do it. And when I do that and I get used to it, two things happen. One, I get what I want and beyond it. Two, it goes from being hard to do to hard not to do.
Sarah Fejfar (40:08)
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (40:09)
And there's a little special thing in there that people, they don't pay attention to. There is something we all do right now that is like drinking water and breathing air for us. It's easy. For somebody else, they've been battling it for the last three, four, five years. They can't figure out how to do it. So they have not been able to access the point of success that you or I have had. And if I look at that thing that's separated, it's really only a thing that I started just doing this. I had the same pain they had, but I go, I'm just gonna keep doing it. I'm gonna keep doing it. I'm gonna keep, I'm gonna keep buttoning my head against it. And eventually it becomes something where when I do it,
Sarah Fejfar (40:21)
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (40:38)
Not only is it hard not to do, it's in my integrity and my identity to get it done. And if I don't, I don't feel like the same Anthony. I feel like I'm letting myself down. So I got to feel like every night I do a daily podcast every weekday. I'm telling you, 80% of the time, I don't want to do it. 10 o'clock hits, I go to bed, but it's who I am to do it. There's no way I'm going to bed without getting it done. And I will sometimes get up out of bed if I forgot. I will get myself down here one in the morning and I'm recording and knocking it out. And I go to bed and I sleep better. Right.
Sarah Fejfar (40:45)
Mm.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (41:06)
The idea is it's who I am to do it. And here's the cool on the far side of it. Lo and behold, I got success in terms of podcasts and bookings and these things get built up and built up and I go, how do you have how do you get so disciplined to do it every day? I didn't get disciplined to do it. Doing it made me disciplined. And that's the magic of all these little things I'm talking to and most people fall short of. So really at the end of the day, the way I got into it was I said something and I have somebody come out and say, hey, this could be higher. And I attached myself to that small action.
Sarah Fejfar (41:13)
Yes.
Yes!
Anthony Trucks (41:36)
And I roll into it and all of a sudden we call it magic, their success. Few people unfortunately do this and if they did, your life would change. That's literally what I do in my dark work is we take all these little segments, we break them into 10 areas and go here are the segments of your life. Let's figure out which ones you want to put in on the pedestal first and add to the point of like your natural cadence to where two, three months from now, it's not hard to do this. It's just what you do.
Sarah Fejfar (42:03)
Mm. Yes.
Anthony Trucks (42:04)
And now you can stack the next level of success on top because it's gonna emotionally feel just as easy as it does today. And that's how you see continued growth over time.
Sarah Fejfar (42:12)
Is that a course or group coaching or a membership your dark work? Okay.
Anthony Trucks (42:16)
It's one on one at the moment. The reason I do it, because the group stuff's cool, but I need to get to the heart and the depth of you. People don't like doing that openly with strangers. And it's okay, I get it. So what we do is have a process that's guided, not just by, you know, how do you feel today? It's a very specific process to every single call we do to guide, to build, to pretty much prepare. But three weeks of like back and forth, we get everything dialed in and they have like an action day and it starts a 90 day process of us keeping you in pocket. Cause a lot of people also, the issue is like, courses are like information, great. And I learn it.
Sarah Fejfar (42:21)
Mm, yeah.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (42:46)
but they don't apply it. 97% of courses don't get finished. Drives me insane. I go, how's only 3% of people finish these things? That's the same, that's saying they finished it, not even that they actually do.
Sarah Fejfar (42:47)
Right?
I'm like a finisher and so it's mind-blogging that stat. I don't understand it. I bought it. I'm going to do it. What are other people doing?
Anthony Trucks (42:58)
Yeah, it's true. Yeah, I know. 50% of people don't even log in. I've literally watched like stats from I think it was teachable 50% of people buy a program and not even log into it. So what happens is you just don't even get in. So what I look at is our program is based around, I'm not going to teach you a whole bunch, we're going to go with we're going to what I've learned, we're going to do the work together, then I'm going to get you in emotion, we're going to track every day of what you do. We have apps, we have at home sheets, you get we have meetings every single week.
It is intact where you're not wandering, right? Because that's the thing is I need you to wake up in three months and go, I feel this sense of limitless, ridiculous power. I can do anything. And it's not because I gave it to you, it's because I held you to the ground and said, hey, keep walking these steps. And you had some clarity and you had the funky moments, but the process, it's beautiful at the end. So you walk out and you're like, not only is this thing accomplished and then some, you have the sense of I can accomplish anything.
Sarah Fejfar (43:38)
Yes.
Yes.
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (43:57)
and more unfolds in time.
Sarah Fejfar (44:02)
I'm going to link that up in the show notes for people. I want to shift for a moment and talk about family and parenting. So I love your philosophy around being a present parent. It's something I really value too. And I work very hard to create experiences that we can share as a family and could share with just mother daughter. And it makes me wonder, we're both entrepreneurs. And I think that lends.
Anthony Trucks (44:05)
Yeah, definitely.
Oh yeah, let's do that.
Mm-hmm.
Sarah Fejfar (44:32)
has made me think differently over the past eight or so years that I've been an entrepreneur. And it's made me think really thoughtfully about what consider what lessons that I want to impart on my daughter. And I think about things like, I want her to know what it's like that it's possible to create income outside of the traditional nine to five, because I didn't know that. And I wanted to know it's possible. Maybe it's not her path, but I wanna know. Also then how to grow that wealth because I was never taught that.
Anthony Trucks (44:50)
Yeah.
Sarah Fejfar (44:59)
And that is like vital to me. And then third, I think about self-awareness and self-compassion because I don't think that there's anything more important that you can like gift you can give yourself than emotional intelligence. And I wonder what lessons are you working to impart on your children?
Anthony Trucks (45:12)
where you are. Heck yeah.
I'm not just saying man. I so one is I need them to realize that they can actually create they can create the income but it's gonna take certain things they have to do that aren't comfortable right so I literally will tell my kids I say do you guys want this life do you like this life you live they go yeah I go well if you don't adhere to what we mean your mom are trying to teach you this will not be your life you won't experience this so if you want to take trips have freedom buy what you want to buy go and do what you want for your own kids or for yourself if you don't understand why we're saying get up and clean the dish do your chore.
Sarah Fejfar (45:36)
Ah, yeah.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (45:47)
You know, these little things that seem simple. You me and your mom do this. We don't even sit in the couch till the day is done, till you're picked up, till dinner's done. Imagine if we chose, I don't wanna pick you up from school today. I don't wanna do dinner for you guys today. Would you eat? No, but that's what we do before we sit in the couch, where you guys come home, mess everywhere and sit down. I go, you're not gonna realize until later, when it's too late, that you're behind the ball. You're not gonna just live in my house and mooch off me. So if you want this lifestyle, here's what it takes. It's the first part of it. But we tell them, we're gonna give you opportunities to understand what that is. So I let them do things to work.
Like we actually have tasks at the house they can actually do and make money doing it. It's not rocket science, but it's going to be hard and they're going to get paid minimum wage. That's how it starts till you build up and you create value enough to be worth more. I can't overpay you because you're my kid. It doesn't make any sense. So we build, we build these kind of thoughts and ideas into them. And in the sense of self-worth, it's twofold. We poke each other as a family a lot. I'm the fat guy in the house, which is weird because I'm not really actually fat, but compared to the rest of my family, I'm the most pudgy, we'll call it. I'm a girl man.
Sarah Fejfar (46:26)
Mmm.
Anthony Trucks (46:46)
And so my wife, she's shredded this track. My twins do stuff. My oldest is off in college and this thing running track. So it's just, but it's a reality. And the thing is, while we understand that's what the case of it is, no one wants, you're a pudgy dad. Like, I don't like hearing it, but I know it. I'm like, I don't need to eat that extra cinnamon roll. And we can keep each other accountable, but here's what happens is them hearing feedback, it's not, you're amazing, doesn't diminish their sense of self-worth. But on the flip side, we also let them know when they're doing dope things.
Sarah Fejfar (47:13)
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (47:14)
I see you killing it. I got you and most people don't give the positive praise It's really weird like it's hard for us as humans to do sometimes But if my son's room is looking okay, bro I see you getting room done like good job like that's all he needs little stuff to feel positive So the self-worth is built through them Essentially they can hear things that aren't the greatest and go okay. I can be better It's not like it's a stamp on your humanity forever when they do those good things they get positive feedback for giving the effort It's not like you're just so great for
No reason. You're amazing just because it's like, no, bro, you're great because you gave the effort here and I see that. Thank you. Like your grades look good. So we let them get the sense of the balance. Because I think it's not just about building them up. It's about making sure they don't get torn down so quick too. Because we can build you up and make you feel great and you enter the world and all of a sudden the world doesn't do what I do. The world says that you suck at this, bro. What's going on? Like, hey, what's wrong with like, and they poke you. If you can't take being poked.
Sarah Fejfar (47:45)
Yes.
Mmm.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (48:08)
All that positive is drained quick and you can't figure out why. I thought I was so great. But now they have this gauge of like, all right, dad, I can poke dad, right? And he can say that. And I see what dad did. Dad, dad went ahead and stopped eating that or he worked a little bit harder. He did extra stuff and he didn't feel bad and he got it. And then he dished it out to me like my daughter comes out like, dang, look at your hair all messed up today. Right. You can say that. She's OK. I got to do my hair. Right. You do it. Look at you. I see you'd find give us men for taking care of yourself like little weird stuff. It's not big, but the dance of it over the years gets ingrained.
Sarah Fejfar (48:22)
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (48:37)
where they understand it's okay to not be perfect, right? But it also is a space where you can be better. And if I do well, I do get the positive praise. I do feel good about myself. And now they're prepared for a real world, which typically is the same. They're gonna poke you and prod you. You take the feedback and you go, oh, okay, cool, I can get better. You don't diminish your sense of self. And when you do, while the world says, good job, you feel good about yourself. You do more and more to feel better about yourself in time. It's a journey over time. I got my dogs in this.
Sarah Fejfar (48:38)
Mmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Mm. Yeah. Oh, so good. Reminds me of, yeah, I can hear your dogs in the background. That's okay. Mine is just napping downstairs. It made me think about the book right before 10X is easier than 2X is called The Gap and the Gain. And so have you read that one? Okay. So
Anthony Trucks (49:08)
Sorry about that.
Yeah, I've heard of it.
I have. Well, I've heard parts of it, but I haven't read all of it. Conceptually, I totally get it. We focus in the gap more than the game, yes.
Sarah Fejfar (49:28)
yeah, well, so we started this family dinner table routine a few weeks ago, after I finished that book where it's like, we got to do three wins from the day each and we did do three forecasted wins for the next day each. And, and then I review mine in the morning, because that's how the book says to do it. And it is magical when you really are measuring backwards instead of measuring forwards is the ideal. And I do want to impart that.
that skill set like you're doing with your children on my daughter because I do think that's so important to get that sense of self-worth on. Like yeah, I did that and I am proud of myself. Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (50:05)
Yeah, which is where it comes from. I mean, my self-worth comes from the efforts I gave. When we try to give people self-worth by just giving them positive praise, they don't actually – there's that – what do they call it? Cognitive bias or cognitive dissonance. We know. Like, when you tell yourself something and your mind knows, you can't change your mind with your mind, if that makes sense. You have to change your mind with actions and proof. And so, when I go, you're just so great. You're just so bright.
Sarah Fejfar (50:19)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Mmm, so good.
Anthony Trucks (50:32)
their brain goes, Oh, my mom thinks I'm great. And they're still like, but what did I what did I do? And they bring up recognize it. Now they're trying to like reconcile why they should feel great when they don't feel great. They didn't do anything great. But if they did something crazy hard, like my daughter, my son, they do workouts, right? They do a workout. And the numbers go up. They get faster. I hell yeah, I say you get that. I remember those days you didn't work that yeah, they do know they did it. Their brain goes, I did do that.
Sarah Fejfar (50:40)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Anthony Trucks (50:55)
I do deserve, and it's locked in different. I get the different swag, they're looser, you know, they're doing, and that's the gift I wanna give them more than just, you're amazing. Because at some point, I'm not gonna be there to say that, and someone else is gonna say it to them. If they don't have proof, it's hard to say it to yourself. So I like to give them situations and moments that allow them to fight through something hard, that dark work I keep talking about. Because when you do that, that's where the self-esteem, the pride, the power comes from, and it becomes momentous. It builds in time.
Sarah Fejfar (51:10)
Oof.
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (51:24)
Because when it's who you are to do those things, you're not going to let yourself down. You're going to fight more. And if you dig it off track, you go, okay, I got off track. It's not who I am to be off track. Let's get back on my path. You snap back into who you built yourself to be. But without those things, without that proof of the past, it's very hard, if not impossible, to wake up and have that sense of power. I can do no matter what this next thing. And that, I believe, is what our lack of our world is having right now. Is you got a bunch of people that don't have, they don't do hard things. It works.
Sarah Fejfar (51:34)
Yeah.
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (51:53)
were catering to the weakness. And when you do that, you do have more depression and sadness because people aren't doing hard stuff to make themselves feel great. And I'm not saying you have to go build something and do CrossFit. Your version of hard, was it hard to learn that piano, that song? Do it, cool. And then when you get done, you go, I feel good about myself, right? When you rob this of people and kids, just to make it easy, you rob them of that personal power they need to actually feel better about themselves in the long run.
Sarah Fejfar (52:00)
Yes.
Yes.
Totally.
So good, what a gift. I've been an Oregonian for about five and a half years now. And I know you have some ties to Oregon. I see your helmet in the background. Tell me what it's like as a parent to have your kid following your footsteps. So you're alma mater.
Anthony Trucks (52:26)
Oh nice, how you doing? Oh I knew it. My son's up there now. Don't go to school.
Oh, it's awesome, man. I love that he's there. My wife and I both went there, but I want him to carve out his complete own experience of it. I don't want to go up there and be like, you're in my shoes, my place. And this is where I, you know, I do tell him like, I went to this track town pizza place. We went here, right? But I like to ask him, hey, what's going on here? Like, I want him to share the things about it because I have to ask because I don't know about it, you know? And it's his own footing. It's his own thing.
Sarah Fejfar (52:45)
Yes.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (53:03)
Because if not, then he does feel there's that shadow possible feeling. He's not doing football, which is good. He's doing his own thing, carving his own track out, literally while running track. But I think that the fun part for me is he is enjoying his experience. I'd say he thoroughly is enjoying it, and he doesn't like when we call it home. We go, hey, I'm going to send you home. He goes, that's not my home. My home is here. I go, OK, you know, so he knows where home's at. He's just off in college. But that's a thing we had to work and build. But it lets us know like he.
Sarah Fejfar (53:14)
Mm.
Oh, that's so sweet.
Anthony Trucks (53:30)
He's centered, man. He's dialed in. I don't worry about him. He's a good human being, like solid human being. He's working his butt off. He knows he can be better. He takes feedback from his coaches and myself, by my wife pretty well, and he works towards things. All the traits you need a developing human to have, this guy's got it. He's lucked out. We definitely lucked out in some aspects. We worked our tail off, but some of that's got to be part luck, because we've got other kids who aren't as dialed in, you know?
Sarah Fejfar (53:44)
Yes.
Yes.
Hahaha!
Anthony Trucks (53:55)
And I love all my kids, don't get me wrong, but like some of they're taking it a little bit easier. Some of you like you can like, they open their mouth and someone's like, you know, like pry their mouth open and feed them. And so he's doing well. It's fun to watch.
Sarah Fejfar (54:07)
All right, last question as we wrap up here. I just value lifelong learning so much and I subscribe to that school of thought that we have to design our own curriculum. And I'm wondering, what are you reading right now? And why did you pick that book?
Anthony Trucks (54:32)
Oh, man.
Sarah Fejfar (54:39)
Mm... Yeah.
Yeah.
Anthony Trucks (54:48)
When you have like notoriety in some way, and I'm not a big, I'm just a guy, but in my area and what I do, people like me and that have a followership, I'm not diminishing my impact on the world, but I'm not this like, look at me, I'm the president. Like some people get a little big up there. And so for me, I do have a space of realizing like, I've asked for this, I want to have this impact. When the impact comes more things, and if I want to be able to continue serving and reaching more, I have to have a sense of like protecting my space. And so the protecting of my piece is big. That's why for me, like family's first, I don't.
Sarah Fejfar (54:53)
Yeah?
Yes.
Anthony Trucks (55:17)
I, oddly, this is not a good thing. I don't post on social media all the time, story-wise at least. I'm not out at every event I can be. I'm not traveling the world all day because I want to be home with my family, with my friends. I want to be here because I want to enjoy the life I'm developing and building. But with that comes poking and prodding. And so making sure I have solid boundaries and having peace in my household, peace in my heart to be able to give to my marriage and my household and serve the world, it's critical. And so that's a book that I'm looking forward to picking up. He sent me a copy of it. It just came out today, actually.
Sarah Fejfar (55:26)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mm.
Anthony Trucks (55:47)
or yesterday I want to say from when we're recording this. But from what I read, one of the chapters he recommended I read, very good book so far from that one chapter. So that's one that I'm digging into now.
Sarah Fejfar (55:57)
Oh, I want to read that one too. All right, Anthony, what have you got going on right now that we should know about and where can Linchpin Nation find you?
Anthony Trucks (56:00)
Grab it.
Oh, head. So here's the I don't know when it's coming out, but the whole brand of dark work launches very shortly. So we go to dark work.com. You'll see a holder website or you'll see the full website, which is pretty much like 95% there. And then everything takes off. Podcasts, we got a beautiful studio in Phoenix, we've been using to be able to do some real cool like backdrop and set it looks amazing. So podcasts will come out, we'll have this actual program of what's called a dark work experience to guide people who we're talking to because it's not
Sarah Fejfar (56:15)
Yay.
Anthony Trucks (56:33)
I call it an experience because experience is the only thing that wires us neurologically and psychologically differently. We're talking about things now, our identity. It's how you're wired neurologically and psychologically. That's what this experience does for people. So we guide them through this, set it all up and hold their hand through. That's where they exit this whole place and emerge as monsters are going in the world and do great things. Outside of that, I'm just dad, husband, I don't know, I do all my same things. I tell people I'm a regular guy with an irregular skill set and desire to help the world.
Sarah Fejfar (56:39)
Yes.
Yes!
Anthony Trucks (57:01)
So that's how I'm gonna keep showing up.
Sarah Fejfar (57:03)
I appreciate you, Anthony. Thanks for being here today.
Anthony Trucks (57:06)
You as well. Thank you.
