Episode 1294: Interview with Patrick Cummings about The Family Business Balancing Act

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining us on episode 1,294 of the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:00:07] Patrick Cummings: I'm Pat Cummings. If you've been listening today and you listen to Scott's podcast, I'd encourage you to invest in yourself invest in other people around you. There's a lot of young men out there, a lot of young families out there that need your help.

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[00:01:00] I think The desire for my home life affected work more than work affected my home life. And what I mean by that is it became very important for me to be active in my kids' life. And you run a business and it's busy.

[00:01:21] Scott Maderer: Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:01:26] If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true calling. In the Inspired Stewardship Podcast, you'll learn to invest in yourself. Invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:52] In today's podcast, I interview Patrick Cummings. I ask Patrick about his book, the Family Business Balancing Act, an Entrepreneur's [00:02:00] Guide to Being a Family. I ask Patrick to share with you his faith and how he learned from mistakes to become a better husband and parent. And I also ask Patrick how you can learn lessons to balance business and family life without sacrificing either.

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[00:03:04] Patrick Cummings is an entrepreneur, a business coach, and a wealth management advisor committed to helping others balance their lives for happier outcomes. He worked in the corporate world for 12 years before deciding when his children were toddlers to start his own business and gain control of his time.

[00:03:20] Patrick is also the author of The Family Business Balancing Act, an Entrepreneur's Guide to Being a Family Man. The book promotes that real success is living a life of no regrets, as both a good family man and a businessman, an active member of his community. Patrick lives in Washington state with his wife Brooke.

[00:03:40] Welcome to the show,

[00:03:41] Patrick Cummings: Patrick. Thanks for having me. I'm really looking forward to it.

[00:03:44] Scott Maderer: Absolutely. I'm excited to talk to you a bit about the book and some more things. But before we go there, I talked a little bit about some of your journey and the intro, but what about your journey and what you do brought you to [00:04:00] decide that you wanted to.

[00:04:01] This book about being an entrepreneur, being a family man, and that balancing act that we have and what wants you to put that out into the world. That's an interesting question. A good question, not an easy one to answer. Cuz it was a journey in itself, right? So I was raised by a single mom.

[00:04:20] Patrick Cummings: If people have heard anything about my story, but raised by a single mom, my brother left when I was nine. My dad was still involved in my life, but it was every other weekend and I was always involved with his work. And my dad was a workaholic. He was raised by a workaholic. That's all he knew.

[00:04:36] He wanted to provide for his family and. That was really the beginning. And then later on in life, after I was married and had kids, I was working in corporate America and I referred to myself as a corporate pond because it was everything for the company. Do whatever you gotta do to make the sales and you make the sales.

[00:04:53] And the next year they increase the forecast and they made the pressure higher and you weren't willing to do it. Somebody. [00:05:00] So I got into business for myself. Got into the investment business in late 1990s. Market had been phenomenal. You couldn't do anything wrong. Of course the tech wreck happened, and then nine 11 and here we go.

[00:05:12] Scott Maderer: And then 2008, then , and then eight.

[00:05:17] Patrick Cummings: But early on when I got into the business a lot of people get into being an entrepreneur because they want the time freedom. They want the flexibility. , whatever they wanna make. At least that's what they say. That's what they say. And I found that I was the hardest boss that I'd ever worked for

[00:05:33] Cause I worked all the time and I was doing what my dad did. And I wasn't spending time with my kids like I said I wanted to do. And so I think it was this evolution of that process and the pressure that was coming down on me from the previous broker dealer that I was working for of how much production you're gonna do every day.

[00:05:54] And I was not being. and I was not being a good spouse, and I finally [00:06:00] just set my foot down and made some changes. And when I made those changes it significantly improved, obviously, the relationship with my, my uh, kids and my wife and I went through a real hard time. And then eventually changed to a different firm.

[00:06:15] Fast forward then several more years and. . My dad passed away three years ago this summer, this year. And part of that process of his passing at the end of his life, there was a lot of he held a lot of resentment for himself and asking for forgiveness, and we talked through a lot of those things and it made me reflect a lot on my past and what I was doing.

[00:06:43] And throughout this whole period of time, I've been asked by our company to be a coach, be a mentor to some of the young people. And I started telling my story and we'll get into some of that a little bit here later probably, but telling my story about, you gotta have a why and [00:07:00] define some of those things.

[00:07:01] And as I did that, some people said, why don't you write this? . And so I'd write a few things down. I'd tell my story some more. And I really enjoyed telling my story cuz people were intrigued by it. And some people said it touched on. And then I was at a Strategic coach session. I've been involved with Strategic Coach for five years, Dan Sullivan's organization.

[00:07:21] And lo and behold, this particular session, one of the things we talked about was everybody should write a book. Everybody has a unique story. And on the flight home from that meeting, , I just wrote out a rough outline. Then I worked on it for a couple of days and I called Scribe Media and said, Hey, I think I have an idea.

[00:07:43] They interviewed me, sent me to another person for an interview. Those two interviews were put together. They came back and said, you got a book. And and so that really was leading up to the journey. But what I found in that journey was also the closure and some healing from losing. .

[00:07:59] Scott Maderer: [00:08:00] You mentioned offhandedly that you got to this point, and then you decided to make some changes in how you were doing things. Was there. An event. Was there a, a wake up event? What caused you to go I need to make some changes, if

[00:08:18] Patrick Cummings: that makes sense. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:08:20] I remember, I don't remember the day on the calendar, but I remember exactly the day that happened and my kids were pretty young. They were in. Elementary school, my wife's a veterinarian. She was working a very stressful job. The owner of the clinic was just a very high pressure person.

[00:08:38] The financial markets, my income was not where I thought it probably should be. We had just recently moved and there was a lot of stress that I was bringing home. And I remember walking into my house. We had just built a new house coming off of a major back surgery. And I walked in the house [00:09:00] and my wife and my kids were just in this massive argument, and everybody looked at me to be the referee and I lost it.

[00:09:10] And I'm ashamed to say it. I just blew up. I turned around out the door, I went, slammed the door and said to myself, I don't even know if I'm coming back. And I'm ashamed of that. and I'm ashamed of how I acted. And it was at that point on my drive out around the countryside that I have to do something different.

[00:09:34] And that's when I made the decision to put a little sign on my garage door, opener above my mirror that said, pray before entering. And I just asked for strength to be able to walk into whatever it was. And. be a role model and not be in a fight.

[00:09:53] Scott Maderer: Do you think how did. Wife and [00:10:00] kids.

[00:10:00] Did I assume you had a conversation with your wife when you got back about that or how was their react? I don't wanna read into it too much, but I'm betting y'all had a little talk my wife and I, one of the challenges that we went through and we almost got divorced a couple years later.

[00:10:19] Patrick Cummings: But we didn't have a conversation when I. Matter of fact, we didn't speak for we didn't talk for probably three days and it was pretty cold in my house. The kids were whoa, we hadn't seen that before. And is dad okay? So things were pretty tenuous for a while, and they didn't know that I put the sign in the car that said Pray before entering.

[00:10:47] They didn't know my thought process. It probably was a good week. My wife would leave on Friday or Saturday and not come home until Monday. And because she was working 24 hours on at this particular [00:11:00] practice. And it was after she had come home and I apologized and But it wasn't the end of the problems, right?

[00:11:07] There was still the stress, the financial stress, the work stress.

[00:11:10] Scott Maderer: It didn't magically make all of that stuff go away,

[00:11:13] Patrick Cummings: no, didn't make it magically go away. But I will tell you that the reminder to pray before entering began a process for me. and it might have been a little tiny bit at a time. And that's why progress not perfection is my tagline, but to make a little bit of progress every day and to sh to try and make sure that I had left that stress at work or I took the stress out on somebody other than my family.

[00:11:42] Scott Maderer: Okay. So let's talk a little bit about that cuz you mentioned pray before entering. How did your faith. Intersect with this process, both of writing the book, but also getting you to the point where you are today where that's what you wanted to share in the book, all of your journey [00:12:00] and be so vulnerable in the book.

[00:12:02] Patrick Cummings: Yeah. I think the faith journey and becoming an entrepreneur started when I was in corporate America in, in. . I was working my tail off. I missed my son's first Christmas program and I'd leave on Monday and get home on Friday and it just wasn't a good life. And if I'd have stayed in that corporate life, I don't know that my marriage would've survived.

[00:12:24] And so when I started in the investment business, I didn't have a single client. Matter of fact, I had one friend in the entire town where we lived, and because I was never. , and so I had no natural market. I had nobody to call, and it was literally cold calling and knocking on doors. And for me to go out and knock on doors every day, physically knocking on doors on the pocket full of business cards was I was physically sick every morning.

[00:12:55] And I prayed every morning. That I'd [00:13:00] make it through that day. And that's what started getting me through that initial part of the process. The challenge or the fault that I had, or the problem I ran into is as things started getting busier and you go away from making those prayers, right?

[00:13:22] It's. . I wasn't praying about the fact that I was all stressed out. I wasn't praying about, Hey God help me have the strength to do these things until it finally exceeded my ability to hold it in. And then once that occurred, really things changed for me. I think the calm the knowing that if I'm doing.

[00:13:45] I'm gonna be okay. And if I treat people the way that I want to be treated, I'm gonna be okay and treat my team the way I want to be treated. Things are gonna work, and until I have that calm and it's just, there's just a lot of [00:14:00] tension. And if somebody hasn't gone through what we're talking about of having that faith, I'm leaning on that.

[00:14:06] leaning on the faith when I lost my dad. Those are tough things to go through. And without the faith it's just

[00:14:12] Scott Maderer: tough. One of the things you mentioned, and of want to circle back to it and pick it up, is a lot of entrepreneurs, like, like you said, go into business for themselves.

[00:14:26] because they've had a bad experience. They've been in a corporate job, they've and I'm just, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna put up with this anymore. I'm gonna become my own boss and have more time and have more money and e every and everything's gonna work out.

[00:14:39] And my wife says the same thing. She says now that you're self-employed, your boss is a real jerk. Yeah. And she means it jokingly. Cuz actually I've gotten a pretty good relat. Now at the same time, I think we all have that experience where at times we're our own worst enemy as an entrepreneur.

[00:14:58] Wh why do you think [00:15:00] that is? Why do you think that irony of we go into business for ourselves wanting these things, and yet oftentimes we create the very thing. that we're trying to leave in a way

[00:15:12] Patrick Cummings: I think part of it goes back to what we call the generational sin. What you were raised by and that goes to default, right?

[00:15:19] So we default to what worked for our dad or default to what we were taught. So I think that's part of it. The other part of it is, I had this overriding fear that I was gonna fail my family overriding fear that I was gonna fail in the business. And there's some pride too, right?

[00:15:39] That, that can creep in. And if you're self-employed and you take vacation, you don't have vacation pay. And so for me it was I had to. Put in every single ounce of effort I could. I had to put in all the hours When I first started, you first started, I didn't have an assistant so I was [00:16:00] doing, I was everything.

[00:16:01] And no one ever talked to me about making sure you keep some energy for your family. Make sure you take some energy for yourself because we only have a finite amount of energy every day. You can't drink another coffee cup of coffee and get more of it. . And if we don't recognize that, I think we just work to achieve that level of what we think is security.

[00:16:28] And the problem, I think as an entrepreneur is once you reach that level of security, I'm okay. I got my bills paid I can pay the car, paid with the house payment, I can feed my kids I can actually get my clothes dry cleaned. We ramp it up and then we ramp it up and we ramp it up and there's no, I think so many times people have to beat the last month, the last quarter of the last year, and that's always their focus.

[00:16:55] I gotta have a better year, I gotta have a better year. What's the [00:17:00] cost? All of that comes at a cost. And I think in the, I think in the business world I don't think anybody trains. an American way is the ever increasing checking account or ever increasing balance statement and your net worth needs to be better this year than it was last year.

[00:17:19] And just like we have this culture that wins enough, enough and am I sacrificing things that I say are near and dear. So that I could beat last month's production.

[00:17:32] Scott Maderer: Yeah. I think and again, to be clear, because I work with as a coach I work with a lot of people in a lot of different situations, and you don't have to be an entrepreneur to create that situation for yourself.

[00:17:44] You can do that as a W two employee or working for a company on a salary. We have a tendency to, to drive ourselves that way. You mentioned the generational curse part. What do you think? What do you think you observed from your dad when it came [00:18:00] to parenting, when it came to business and how did you recognize that and begin to change that mindset from this is what must be right?

[00:18:09] Cuz this is what I saw when I was growing up, so to speak. .

[00:18:13] Patrick Cummings: Yeah. My parents were both in public education neither one of 'em are an entre entrepreneur. They couldn't understand being self-employed, they couldn't understand that risk. And so for my dad to increase his income, he had to take on additional roles at school.

[00:18:30] He had to become a basketball coach on top of teaching or set up the. Championship track tournaments and things like that. And so his compensation would, could only increase if he did those extra things. But then my dad was my dad was very driven very strong type a personality as performance based and everything had to be done right.

[00:18:57] And if you weren't gonna do it right, don't [00:19:00] do it. And so in a way he. It was difficult because he was really hard on me, but it created work ethic, right? And so I think there was that part. And my parents, again, they didn't understand being self-employed. I didn't want. a life where, number one, I had to deal with parents.

[00:19:20] Teach teachers are always dealing with parents. That's the hardest part of their job. Yes, they do and I didn't wanna do that. I didn't wanna be I didn't want my pay to be set by the state agency or the the education system. If I was gonna work hard. I wanted to get compensated for that.

[00:19:39] I thought I wanted a better lifestyle, but they had some summers off. Most of the time they were going to college or going to school, but I didn't want to fall into that same thing for me to do, make enough more to go on a vacation. I had to take on an entire nother role. And that was significantly different.

[00:19:59] My. [00:20:00] didn't get to hire an assistant right. For him. The school district did that. It was where, when you become an entrepreneur one of the things that I realized fairly early was that I wasn't good at everything and I needed to begin hiring people that could fill those voids and for me, giving up some of that control.

[00:20:21] So my dad wanted to control everything. I wanted to give up some of that. . And then the other part of it, my dad always said he was focused on family, but to me he was always focused on the wellbeing of the other student athletes. Like they were more important and that was hard. And from a faith journey standpoint, when I was growing up, my dad was not a.

[00:20:47] As a matter of fact, there was a, it wasn't a megachurch because megachurch didn't exist back in the seventies, really as they are today. But there was this church that we would drive by every other weekend. I'd go to his house [00:21:00] and he would call him a bad name. And to me, growing up, if he went to church, it was this bad name that my dad talked about.

[00:21:07] I loved my dad. Don't get me wrong. , he was my idol, right? I never get to see and whatnot. And so for me growing up church wasn't a positive because this particular church, in fact did steal people's homes. They did take all their money, they did run off, and it was a bad deal.

[00:21:25] But I always had a nagging desire that there had to be something. . And so I dunno if I answered your question, but it being raised by my dad as somebody who was not an entrepreneur who didn't understand what I was trying to accomplish. And then later on life, he was pretty hard on me for working too much early on.

[00:21:49] And double edged sword.

[00:21:52] Scott Maderer: Yeah. But it sounds like your dad, at least towards the end, regretted some of the [00:22:00] choices he made, the decisions he'd made. You know that because you mentioned him trying to get to a point of forgiveness with you. Absolutely. And your siblings and so on. Where, when do you, is this all kind of comes back to the same moment, do you think it was that blow up moment with your own family that kind of made you realize maybe I'm making some of the same mistakes? , I saw a model to me. Or was there was it a more gradual change than that or was that kind of the eye-opening moment for some of that?

[00:22:32] I

[00:22:32] Patrick Cummings: really think that was an eye-opening moment for me because I was so ashamed of how I acted. And my dad and my brother both have explosive personalities and I saw that myself and I was ashamed of how I acted and I think God hit me at a two by four that day so it was pretty, it was a pretty quick thing to recognize now, [00:23:00] not just flipping, changing it.

[00:23:02] Yeah. Yeah. The next thing was it's changing and it's not just flipping a light switch and everything's good. Because there was also the fear in them. Okay, is this Fuse gonna go off? .

[00:23:11] Scott Maderer: Yeah. And in some ways the fact that it wasn't a regular event, but was an unusual event in some ways almost makes it harder for them to believe that it's not gonna happen again.

[00:23:21] Exactly. In a way. Not that it being a regular event would've been quote, better, but it Correct. At least it would've been predictable thing. Yeah. I ironically, Yeah it is amazing how quickly the human brain can get used to things good or bad.

[00:23:42] Good or bad. We adapt to our environment and that's a good thing, and that's a bad thing. it's a, there's a good side of that and a bad side of that. As you think about the changes you made with your spouse, with your kids as a parent now, [00:24:00] How do you think some of the lessons you learned at work affected what you do at home and at home affected what you do at work?

[00:24:07] What was some of the feedback between those two? I think the desire for my home life affected work more than work affected my home life. And what I mean by that is it became very important for me to be active in my kids' life. And you run a business and it's busy and you have a good team around you.

[00:24:34] Patrick Cummings: I wanted to treat my team the same,

[00:24:41] the same way I wanted to be treated. And so if I was asking for their permission for me to go out and take a half a day or leave early or do things with my kids, I wanted to extend that to them. And my, [00:25:00] my team. works really hard, and now that they've been with me for a while, they understand that if they need to go to a grandkids event or they need to go to a kid's program or take their son or daughter to a traveling hockey game I want them to do that because it's really important them to be able to do that. But at the same time, I do have an expectation that the work's gonna get done, that I'm not gonna have to hire another person just to fill in. And what has happened through that process is I think my team works harder and more efficiently today than they did maybe before.

[00:25:43] I was sharing that flexibility with them. . Now I've had people take advantage, right? And they don't last very long because they begin taking advantage. And that's like a cancer within the organization. And so we've had to [00:26:00] make some changes very seldom. And family sees that I work hard and I tell 'em that I'm gonna work hard but now when I tell 'em, Hey, I'm gonna be here for this.

[00:26:14] Unless something major happens like major, I'm gonna be there. Because the worst disappointment is to tell your family or to tell your child or tell your spouse I'm gonna be there. And then you don't show. Oh, because a client called or whatever. Cuz I remember as a kid looking in the bleachers, wondering where my dad was.

[00:26:36] and the most disappointing times were when he said he was gonna be there and he wasn't. Yeah. I was disappointed if he wasn't there, but he told me he couldn't be there. But it was just such a dramatic, it was dramatically worse feeling of disappointment when he didn't show up. And I had done that.

[00:26:57] I had done that to my kids. and [00:27:00] to my wife because client called and Oh my goodness, I can't lose this case or whatever. So I think Scott from that perspective, it's I want them to be happy at home and I want 'em to be happier. And that's really what we focus on in our practice.

[00:27:17] And every week our weekly meeting, we talk about a positive focus. And a positive focus cannot be work. Cause I wanna know what's going on in their. . And I'm compassionate I want to be compassionate and almost to a fault. To some degree. But I think that leads more into my

[00:27:35] business

[00:27:35] Patrick Cummings: life than it did business to home.

[00:27:36] Scott Maderer: Okay. One of the things that you've said is that family is in a way your most important client. What do you mean

[00:27:45] Patrick Cummings: When you say. . Yeah. That's a part of my book that if I was gonna change anything, I'd try and figure out how to reword that .

[00:27:54] Scott Maderer: Okay.

[00:27:55] Patrick Cummings: But I wanted it, but I wanted there to be a little shock and awe in that statement, [00:28:00] in that, wait a minute your family's not a client.

[00:28:03] You shouldn't treat 'em like a client. What I mean by that is how many times are you gonna go into a big client meeting and you're gonna carry in your cell phone or your tablet, and you're gonna be looking at. That you're gonna take a phone call, that you're gonna be distracted, or are you gonna go into that big meeting with that client and are you going to pay attention to what they're doing?

[00:28:27] Pay attention to what they're saying. So the reason I said that is that do we give our family as much attention in the focus as we do our biggest client? And I think the thing that really ha is important to me, and the longer I've been in the business, some of my clients tell me how much they respect it, is I will tell them that I cannot meet with them on Friday [00:29:00] afternoon because that is my time for my family that we have stuff set.

[00:29:04] Thursdays at noon, normally, Thursdays at noon is. Date lunch with my wife and she got called into work today. She had the work today and we had this podcast to record and, which is fine but we make sure that gets rescheduled. If you're going out to dinner and it's a once a week thing and you're going out to dinner and everybody's sitting at the table with a.

[00:29:31] or a tablet, you're not giving them the same level as attention as you're giving your best client. And when I said that, I don't look at my family as a client, right? But I hope you, I hope the listeners understand what I mean here in that if they're that important then pay attention.

[00:29:51] If you go to an. With your client to go golfing or do whatever you do, [00:30:00] are you taking outside interruptions when you're supposed to be with them? And if you are, shame on you. But take that same approach with family.

[00:30:09] Scott Maderer: L saying it a different way, I, if you start taking your best client for granted, like they're just always gonna be there.

[00:30:20] it doesn't usually take too long before they're not there anymore. bingo. It's same thing with your family. If you start taking them for granted and just treating 'em like they're always gonna be there. So bingo. Then you know, we, I think we all know the very successful entrepreneur that has three divorces.

[00:30:38] Whatnot because they've taken the family part for granted and never put the time and energy into it that it takes. Yeah. And they

[00:30:47] Patrick Cummings: say, I can't understand why you're leaving me. I've given you all of this stuff. Yeah. And yeah. Yeah. So I've provided all of this monetary support and therefore you should always be thankful and be here.

[00:30:59] Scott Maderer: But [00:31:00] and that's important, but it. The most important thing what are some of the values that you have? You've mentioned a few as we've been talking about it. That you think, do you think you have different values at home than you do at work? Or do you try to have the values be the same in an alignment between the two?

[00:31:20] Or how do you look at values, both as an entrepreneur and as a dad, a spouse? ,

[00:31:27] Patrick Cummings: I really try and have the same value. I want to be the same person at work as I am at home and vice versa. I think somebody sometimes can be fake and I never want to be even thought of being fake.

[00:31:45] And I always want to be who I am and authentic and there's times when. all of us can have a bad day, right? I've had meetings where clients have shown up to the [00:32:00] office and something has gone awry in my life, and I have just told them I know you took the time to be here today.

[00:32:08] I am not a hundred percent. . And I'll share, as long as it's not too private, I'll share what's going on so that they understand I'm human. Because on the other side of that, they may have to cancel an appointment. And when I ask people come, they come to my office, you doing okay today?

[00:32:25] Is today a good day still to go through this information? I want them to be authentic with me because I can't help 'em if they're not. Drives my wife a little bit crazy because my wife is very introverted. She's very private, and I don't think you can make a connection with people at a level to develop a really solid, a level of respect and trust if you're not being you.

[00:32:53] Scott Maderer: That, that brings me to a follow up question. In this [00:33:00] book you're pretty vulnerable. You share some pretty personal stories and you shared some today on the podcast, and there's even more in the book. People are still getting part of it here.

[00:33:11] Why did you decide to be so vulnerable when you write.

[00:33:15] Patrick Cummings: Part of it goes back to what I said earlier, to go through some healing but to also share that it's okay to be vulnerable and guys are taught not to cry. Guys are taught to be tough. Just create your teeth and get through it and.

[00:33:32] There's some bad medical things that can happen to you if you just hold everything in all the time. But I wanted to be vulnerable, not from the perspective as I wanted somebody to go, oh man, I feel sorry for that guy cuz he went through this. We all have stuff. And the vulnerability part for me actually came out with my men's group at.

[00:33:57] and it was a small group of guys or six [00:34:00] guys, and we all signed a document saying nothing in this room leaves this room. As we started having conversations where people brought stuff out and we shed tears together and there is a healing process that occurred. You ask God for forgiveness, but you gotta forgive yourself.

[00:34:22] And I think showing people the vulnerability tells every, tells people that they're not alone. If somebody's out there struggling I was at a conference and part of my book talks about, A really difficult timeframe with my son and I was at a conference a couple weeks ago and we, and I was talking about the book and a few things in the book, and this guy came to me afterwards and said, I'm really struggling with my son.

[00:34:46] His life choices aren't what his mom and I would agree with and. He says, I've never told anybody that. And we sat there and shed some tears and had a cup of coffee and we talked about it and he left and he [00:35:00] texted me as he was on his way home that night, that on the airplane he wrote a letter to his son to talk about all of the things that he saw in his son that were his uniqueness and what he appreciated about him and.

[00:35:18] I, I think sharing that vulnerability, Scott can help other people realize that being vulnerable is scary. My wife read the first three chapters of the book, put it down and said, I can't read anymore of it because I'm not vulnerable, but, and she asked me why. And I said, if I can save a marriage or I can save a kid's life because I was vulnerable, God put it on my heart to.

[00:35:43] And so that's why and I'm a pretty emotional guy. I it doesn't take much for Pat to shed a tear, but I care about people and I wanted to exude that in the book that you can get through [00:36:00] this, right? It's step by step. It's not a, it's not a light. , but to be vulnerable is okay.

[00:36:07] You have to be able to be vulnerable in a safe place. Now, is the book a safe place? I don't know. , I don't know. But really that's why I was that vulnerable.

[00:36:19] Scott Maderer: I and in some ways the book is a safe place just because it. , I guess the people that are turned off by it are gonna stop reading anyway, exactly. They're exactly they're not gonna get through chapter three. . .

[00:36:36] Patrick Cummings: You're right. They won't .

[00:36:37] Scott Maderer: My brand is inspired stewardship and I run things through that lens of stewardship, and that's what we talk about a lot on the show. And yet that's one of those words that I've discovered over the years means different things to different.

[00:36:51] So when you hear the word stewardship, what does it mean to you and what has the impact of that meaning had on your life?

[00:36:58] Patrick Cummings: Yeah. [00:37:00] Stewardship to me is being a good steward of what you have and who you're, and some people can be good stewards with money. Some people can be do good stewards with gifts.

[00:37:09] Others can be good stewards just in, in fitting and listening. And I think we need to take a step back and look. What is our uniqueness and how can that help other people instead of holding it inside? And so being a good steward, number one is the golden rule. First off, you treat others the way you want to be treated.

[00:37:32] And if our country was treating others the way everybody wanted to be treated, things would be a lot nicer. But then if you have excesses don't just hoard those excesses. One of the greatest things that has happened for our organization is every year we adopt a couple of single parent families from a, from an underprivileged school district and we provide them with just a really happy, [00:38:00] wonderful Christmas.

[00:38:00] And those kids actually think it's Santa Claus, right? And I love being able to do that. I love being able to help the woman's shelter. And just from a stewardship standpoint, and then part of my time I volunteered to talk to young individuals about what is it gonna be like being a brand new dad?

[00:38:21] What is it like starting a business? And so taking those gifts that were given and putting them to good. . I think that to me is really good stewardship.

[00:38:30] Scott Maderer: So this is my favorite question. If I invented this magic machine and was able to pluck you from the chair where you are today and transport you magically into the future, maybe 150, 200 years, and through the power of this machine though, you were able to look back and see your entire.

[00:38:50] And all of the relationships, all of the connections, all of the impacts that you've left behind, what impact do you hope you've left on the world?[00:39:00]

[00:39:00] Patrick Cummings: That we value one another? That we value one another? There's no trailer hitch hook to a Hearst, right? So you're not gonna pull it with you. But I think if people could. be more graceful to one another and have more patience with one another. I think that's a huge impact. The other impact that, that you're trying to make and a lot of people are trying to make is dad's need to be more involved.

[00:39:30] And what I mean by that is that. Not just sitting in the stands watching a volleyball game, and you have your laptop computer involved. And part of my book talks about what happens when a dad's not involved in the little girl's life or little boy's life. I guess if there's anything is that you're your listeners become a person of value.

[00:39:57] And at the end of the day, no one cares how much [00:40:00] money's in your bank account. That Pat was a great guy. He lived life to his fullest and he taught us how to not only be a good person, a hard worker but that other people, everybody has a unique value.

[00:40:14] Scott Maderer: So what's coming next for you as you continue on this journey, as you've put the book out into the world?

[00:40:18] What's on the roadmap?

[00:40:20] Patrick Cummings: Wow. It's blowing me away actually. I'll be invited to be on a lot of podcasts, like this podcast and when I wrote the book, I had no expectations and I was hoping to sell five copies. And what's exciting to me, I'm having some organizations ask me to come speak and it's organizations with churches, it's men's group organizations, but it's also some entrepreneur entrepreneurial organizations and actually talked to a.

[00:40:52] Somebody in human resources of a pretty large company the other day, and they said, we're always given awards. That's our whole thing is [00:41:00] award ceremonies. And in this particular company down in, in Arizona, and good friend of mine been a client for 20 plus years. He said, Hey, what if we don't give production awards out this year?

[00:41:14] Maybe we talk about what it is to be a good. . So this company doesn't have a lot of entrepreneurs, right? But their divisions get bonuses or whatever. And so things like that are exciting because they think if a manager can take the same approach that I'm talking about in the book and treating their employees or treating their team what could happen?

[00:41:35] What could we turn, what could we turn around? And the other thing is just. Hearing from fathers that maybe this book is made in a practice being able to speak and do that I'm right in the process right now of acquiring an aircraft, an airplane, and I wanna be able to fly to locations to do workshops.

[00:41:57] And flying commercially these days is no [00:42:00] fun. And. and I just see myself in the investment business that I have. I have a great business partner that I'll be transitioning the business over to him over the next 5, 6, 7 years. I'll stay involved cuz I love people, but I'm passionate about helping people become better humans and getting through these things.

[00:42:23] So I think what excites me the most and what's in store moving forward. Awesome.

[00:42:33] Scott Maderer: You can follow Patrick on LinkedIn as Patrick Cummings. P Strategies, that's p N as in Nancy, P Strategies, or you can find him under PMP strategies on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Or find out more about Patrick and the book over@pnpstrategies.com. Of course, I'll have links to all of those over in the show notes as well.

[00:42:55] Patrick, is there anything else you'd like to share with the.[00:43:00]

[00:43:00] Patrick Cummings: I don't think so. I just hope that they check out my website. On the website, there's a video that talks about who I am and how I was raised and just give a better snippet of that. And then if they're so inclined to, to buy the book, they can press the link on the website. And if they want more information, they can always email me too.

[00:43:18] The email is pmp strategies outlook.com or@outlook.com or just on the website. They can. With me. But I'd encourage people to to take the next step right to, to take the next step to do that.

[00:43:33] Scott Maderer: Awesome. Thanks so much.

[00:43:40] Thanks so much for listening to the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively. But act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode please do us a [00:44:00] favor. Go over to inspired stewardship.com/itunes.

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