Shift into a Higher Gear with Dr. Delatorro McNeal Sponsored by Acorns

You are now tuning in to Discover Your Potential. So listen, participate, be inspired. Know that you can discover your potential. Empowered greetings, friend. Welcome back to Shift Into a Higher Gear. Better your best and live life to the fullest. We're in Chapter 2, Shift from Coasting to Living Life 3D. My friend, aren't you done? Aren't you tired? Aren't you frustrated with just coasting through life? just kind of haphazardly going through life? And aren't you ready to live life under power, engaged, passionate? Let me ask you an honest question. This is a real matter of fact question. How old are you? See, I asked that question because I'm actually 44 at the time of this recording. And according to the United Nations, the international average life expectancy of the average human being is 72.6 years young. 72.6 years young. So I have a very hard question for you. I want you to take 72.6 minus your age right now, and that tells me one powerful thing, and that tells you one powerful thing. Tells you how many summers you got left. How many summers, my friend, do you have left? And here's my question. Based upon whether you got 10 summers left, based upon that study, or 30 summers left, or 50 summers left, how are you going to leverage? How would you live your life? What trips would you take? What languages would you learn? What dances would you study and master? What cruises would you go on? What would you, what jobs would you take? How would you grow and scale your business? What would you do to be a better parent if you knew you only had that number of summers left? See, my friend, the time to take your life to the next level and live your life to the fullest is actually right now. We're in front of this incredible Dolly Museum here in downtown St. Petersburg, and I love this three-dimensional image, and I love 3D movies. And I wanna tell you something powerful and profound. All your life you were lied to. Yeah, because you were taught that in order to measure for full and fulfilling life, we measure it one dimensionally. You were taught to measure a full life one dimensionally. You were taught to celebrate length of years. And if someone lived till they were 80 or 90 years old, we said they lived a full life. Well, my friend, the truth is we got to shift from one dimensional living to three dimensional living, where we learn how to live wide, we learn how to live long, and we learn how to live deep. And this is exactly what we go into in this incredible book. Let me ask you one powerful question or another powerful question. What is the commonality between Bruce Lee, Princess Diana, Bob Marley, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Jesus Christ, Malcolm X, Chris Farley? What is the common, Selena, what is the common denominator between all of these amazing people? Guess what? Not a single one of them live beyond the age of 40 years old. Every single one of them. These people will be known throughout human history for the rest of lives and our lives. Not because they lived long, but my friend, because they lived long, wide, and deep. And when you live life three-dimensionally, you don't necessarily have to live to your 150 to make a global impact with your life. My friend, at the end of the day, you got to get out of coasting, getting out of nonchalant living, getting by with just getting by with things as they are. And you got to get into living life under power by living life long, wide, and deep. We go into this in great detail in this chapter of this incredible book to help you shift into a higher gear, better your best, and live your life to the fullest. Dr. De La Toro McNeil II. Shift into a higher gear, better your best, and live life to the fullest. Available on Amazon.com. audible, and everywhere books are sold. You could be one shift away from your biggest breakthrough. Visit shiftintoahighergear.com to learn more. Welcome to The Shift. We all have the ability to get 1% better every day, and the biggest room in the world is always room for improvement. That is a quote from our very special guest today. You're watching Discover Your Potential, and I'm your host, Dan Gilman, and I am honored and blessed to have a dialogue with the amazing and extraordinary guest, Dr. De La Toro McNeil. And Dr. McNeil is an internationally renowned peak performance expert who's delivered keynote speeches to a variety of entities across the globe. And also, I should mention, through the Biden and Harris administration and Trinity International University of Ambassadors, he was awarded with the Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award as an ambassador to the United Nations, which is absolutely incredible. He holds a CSP designation, which is the highest international recognition of professional speaking excellence, in the top 12% of paid professional speakers worldwide. Thank you so much for greeting us here. An honor to be here with you, Dan. I'm really, really excited about this subject matter, about your incredible show, and I'm excited for the folks that are tuning in because I know they're going to get great value. Oh, absolutely. No question. And I didn't mention that you are a published author. You published a book called Shift into a Higher Gear, along with a companion workbook. I can't show it because I'm waiting for mine to come in, but I'm really excited. And here's the other thing. So I'm going to gift like four or five or even more people from my audience your book, because I absolutely think that you've touched my soul and my life, and I'd like others to be touched as well and shift into a year, because this year is going to be not only my year, but a lot of people's year. So I'm really looking forward to that. Absolutely. I think that's fantastic. And I think that they will be tremendously blessed to receive that from your show. So that's a fantastic thing. And thank you so much for letting me know how much the book and the workbook and the content is really, really impacting your life. It's really amazing. Yeah, absolutely. I'm kicking off that kickstand and I'm just taking the bike out. Even though I wish I, you know, not I wish, maybe sometime I will be riding a motorcycle. You never know. I have a cousin who does. You never know. That's right. That's right. And even though the purpose of the book is not to convert people to become motorcycle riders per se at all, but the purpose of the book is really to teach people how to shift. It's just the metaphor is so powerful. And Dan, what's amazing to me is, and I wrote the book with this intention, but people reach out to me all the time. They say, listen, I don't even own a motorcycle. But every time I see a motorcycle on the road, I think of you. I think of the book and it reminds me of the lessons. And so that was very intentional, Dan, because I wanted to create what's called in psychology and in neuroscience, a neurological, a positive neurological association. And what a neurological association is, is when basically, have you ever smelled a perfume or a cologne and you thought about a person, even though the person wasn't there? Yeah, that's called a neurological association. You might see a color or you might hear a sound or a song or you might smell something or you might see something. And it makes you think like, you know, because I travel a lot. One of my aunts, she says, every time I see a plane in the air, I just say a prayer for you. And I say, even though you're probably not even on that particular flight. Every time I see a plane in the air, I just say, Lord, bless my son, wherever he is. Right. So she created a neurological association years ago and she still uses it to this day. So the cool thing about the book is because it's built on a motorcycle metaphor and motorcycles are a very, very popular motor transportation all over the planet, Dan, when people read this book, shift into a higher gear and they start learning and absorbing and applying the principles every time they see a motorcycle. That's what I encourage them to realize is that that's life, God, source, the universe, whatever you want to call it, giving you a gentle reminder to apply those principles to your life and shift into a higher gear. Absolutely. No, that is incredible. So here's what's funny, Dan. What I love about this book, bro, is that so about 12 years ago, I started riding motorcycles and I have one primary motorcycle and I'm not like some extreme motorcyclist where I've got like 10 bikes and I love to like work on my bikes on the weekend. I've never been to a bike show. I've never been to a bike rally. I'm not a part of a biker club where I have the same jacket as 20 other people. So I'm not that guy particularly. I just bought a motorcycle 12 years ago because I wanted an alternate mode of transportation. I always thought they were cool. And I just, and I wanted to save on gas actually. So I got one and I fell in love with it. And every time I would ride it, I would start getting all these downloads, right. About how life and business parallel aspects of motorcycle riding, because one of the things that God has used me for, he teaches me things through metaphors. So So people know me on Instagram. I'm at Dr. Del Toro on Instagram, on all social media, actually. But on Instagram, I do this thing called the Del Toro Dash. And it's a 60-second motivational teaching that's really powerful and transformational. And nine times out of 10, I'm using some form of a metaphor. And so God always talks to me in metaphors. And what I started getting was all these downloads about how life and business paralleled motorcycle riding. Every time I would take my bike out, I would get this lesson or that lesson. Or I'd be in traffic and experience this. That applies to business. That applies to life. That applies to purpose. That applies to discovering one's potential, right? And so it was really, really powerful. So Dan, I did something that most people don't do. First lesson, I started to write down what those metaphors and those examples were. And I didn't take for granted when God was dropping the lessons on me. so what's the first footnote if you want to discover and develop your potential my friend when you get those nudges when you get those nudges from life those nudges from god those nudges from source those nudges from from and don't just blow it off grab a journal and start writing down what is being downloaded to you because i believe it never was coming to you but it was meant to come through you to bless humanity in some way. Love it. And you mentioned in the book that there's just small things that you can make that make a huge or big difference rather, that are three small shifts that people can make. And I'd love for people to hear this. I'm just, I'm really excited to share everything that you teach actually with so many people, because like you said, Now's this year. For example, people are in, you mentioned this before in your talk, people are in jobs that they don't stand. They can't stand it. They do it because they need money. They have families and they feel stuck. They're not following. And I felt this way too because I absolutely connected They not following their purpose Yeah And we just had Dr Gary Sanchez on he talks about his why Yeah And and it all part of that formula, right? But, but it, it's just, it resonates with me. Anyway, I'll let you answer the question. So. So there's so many, one of the things, so every chapter in the book begins with the action verb shift. And I love that because one of the things that I'm so committed to all the time is really just helping people with this narrative, with this conversation around what it means to allow the small changes to make the big difference, right? And that's one of the, so each chapter starts with the action verb shift. And the definition of shift is to move or cause to move from one place to another, especially over a small distance. I'm going to say that again. The definition of shift is to move or cause to move from one place to another, especially over a small distance. Another definition of shift is a slight change in position, tendency, right? Thought, habit, action, behavior, right? So it's this notion that it's a slight change or causing to move something from like I can shift my camera right now just a little bit and it can make a big difference, right? Like I could shift lighting in my, and it's a small thing that can make a big difference, right? Have you ever been outside and you were trying to take a selfie and you were in the wrong direction of the sunlight and it came out dark. And then as soon as you shifted just a little bit, the sun's like, boom. And now your son kissed. It's like a gorgeous photo, right? The small things that make the big difference. And so the truth is my friend, I believe we've been lied to in personal development. We were taught that we had to make these massive changes to get massive results. And you don't have to do that. Why? Big trucks roll on small tires. Big doors swing on little hinges. Big forest fires start off with small matches. At the end of the day, big oak trees start off with a small acorn. A big forest begins with a few seeds in the ground. right so at the end of the day it's the small things that make the big difference if you see a massive corn field it started off with small corn seeds that were planted in rows consistently it's the small things billion dollar companies dan merge not with the 80 000 employees that are employed by those companies right isn't it amazing how a company could have 80 000 employees and merge with another company with six people in a small boardroom. It's the small things that end up making the biggest difference. 80,000 people get together to watch two people box it out in a boxing ring. If you're listening to this show, it's because you believe in growth. You believe in potential. And that makes this the perfect moment to talk about acorns. There's not much you can do about the money you've got right now, but if you want to do something about the money you could have tomorrow, Acorns wants to help. With the Acorns Potential screen, you can finally see what your money is capable of. Acorns is a smart way to give your money a real chance to grow. It's easy. You can sign up in just minutes and start automatically investing your spare money, even if all you've got is spare change, literally. Acorns can take your roundups from everyday purchases and put them to work for you. And Acorns grows with you. Whether you're just starting out, planning the next chapter, or getting serious about long-term goals, Acorns supports your journey across every life stage. With the Acorns Potential screen, you get a clear picture of the power of compounding, how your money could grow over time. and you can quickly adjust how much you're investing every day, week, or month to keep yourself on track. Acorns is also all-in-one. No more juggling five different finance apps. With Acorns, you can invest, save, and give your money a chance to grow all in one trusted place. Sign up now and Acorns will boost your new account with a $5 bonus investment. Join the over 14 million all-time customers who have already saved and invested over $27 billion with Acorns. Head to acorns.com slash dyp or download the Acorns app to get started. Paid non-client endorsement. Compensation provides incentive to positively promote Acorns. Tier 2 compensation provided. Potential subject to various factors such as customers' accounts, age, and investment settings. Does not include Acorns fees. Results do not predict or represent the performance of any Acorns portfolio. Investment results will vary. Investing involves risk. Acorns Advisors, LLC, and SEC Registered Investment Advisor. View important disclosures at acorns.com slash dyp. 100,000 people get together for a concert to hear one artist. Right? It's the small things that really make the big difference. So I want you to start thinking, and I use those examples really a lot because I really want to give people as many. It's like the Pareto principle, the 80-20 rule, right? 20% of what you're doing is producing 80% of your results. 20% of the quote in your closet represent 80% of what you wear on a daily basis. 20% of the customers for a company represent 80% of the sales. 20% of the people that go to church represent 80% of the people that give the money to the church. So it's the small things that make the big difference. So let me give you three small shifts you can make right now at the top of this new year that I really believe is going to help take you to the next level, my friend. Number one, yeah, shift, Dan. We have to learn to shift. If we're going to discover and develop and build out our potential, we have to shift from I have to to I get to. It's the first shift I want you to make. And here's the reason why that's so important. Coming into a new year, we have all this stuff. Oh, man, I want to achieve this. I want to achieve that. Resolutions, goals, right? Changes in habits, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We're trying to get on with all this energy. And part of the challenge with that is the fact that nine times out of 10, when you think about all the things that must be accomplished in your day, in your week, in your month, in your year, in your quarter, it's I have to, I have to, I have to. And I have to is obligation. To your brain, the term I have to is obligation. Small shift, that'll make a big difference. I want you to change that phrase and change one word in it. Instead of saying I have to do X, Y, Z, say I get to do X, Y, Z. I do this every day, Dan, because, I mean, listen, it's ingrained in all of us. Every day, I'll say I have to do something. I say, you know what? I caught myself. I don't have to. I get to. It might be 9 o'clock in the morning. I say, oh, man, I got to run downstairs. I have to take my supplements. No, I get to take my supplements. It changes my entire attitude. Oh, man, my puppy's got to go out. I have to take him for a walk. I get to take my puppy on a nice walk today. Changes my whole attitude. I have to cook dinner. I get to prepare a delicious, nutritious meal for my family. Big difference. It's 3.30. I have to go and pick up my kids from school. That's going to be a boring chore kind of ride. But as soon as you say it's 3.30, I get to go pick up my children from a day of learning and have fun with them on the way back, it's now an adventure. Think about it if you're in a relationship, if you're in a committed relationship. Oh my gosh, she's horny, he's horny, I have to have sex. Versus I get to make love to the person that I care most about. I guarantee you the outcome is going to be much different. Does that make sense? I have to as an obligation, I get to as an opportunity. Think about in your health and fitness. I have to go to the gym, right? I get to go take care of my body and my future self will thank me for it, right? So change from I have to or shift from I have to to I get to, that's one shift. That can make an epic difference, Dan. What do you think about that? Just that one, right? I got two more to go, but just give me your thoughts on that one and how powerful that one can be in life. Shifting your whole mindset, right? So that's the whole point. So yeah, Yeah, no, absolutely. It makes a huge difference. Instead of going, oh, I have to go do this again today. Right. You shift your whole mindset. You're also changing the way you're thinking about, you know, I got to make phone calls. I got to do cold calls to get in touch with people. Yeah. No, I'm going to get on the phone with them and make a difference in this world. That's right. Absolutely. Get it. 100%. So another shift that I want to invite folks to make at the top of this year is I really want to encourage you to shift from life is happening to me. Another one word shift that will make an epic difference. Life is happening to me to life is really happening for me. I think a lot of times we walk around life in a victim mentality. We walk around life really feeling like we're the victim of things. And I really want to encourage you and challenge you to really shift out of victimhood because when you're in a victim position, you have no power. You have no power when you're the victim. The only way you have power is when you are what's called at cause. And what makes you at cause is when you get on the cause side of the equation, right? We've all heard it before. To every effect, there's a cause, right? So you want to get on the cause side of the equation so that way you can drive the result that you want in your life. In order to get on the cause side of the equation, you got to be able to say that life is happening for me and not to me. So even the bad things, even the challenging things, I got laid off, that layoff happened for me, not to me. As long as you think that the layoff happened to you, my money is going to be messed up by this, by that. All your thoughts are coming from that place. All your energy is coming from that place. The second you say, man, that layoff happened for me, that thing freed me up. That thing gave me an opportunity to do something I never wanted to do before. It's given me a chance to now invest the time I was investing in that job. Now I get to invest it in my dream. That divorce, no matter how heart-wrenching and devastating it was, it didn't, and I've gone through divorce before, it didn't happen to me. It really happened for me. It made me better. Taught me a lot of lessons. Taught me how to love and value myself. It taught me how to pour into myself as much as I was pouring into other people. It taught me how to value and appreciate myself. It taught me how to hold high standards for myself. It taught me how to practice self-care. It taught me how to deal with childhood wounds that I had. It didn't happen to me. It happened for me. So no matter what happened in your life, is it possible that it didn't happen to you, but it happened for you? Here's another one that's really a blessing. along those same lines you haven heard this one Dan but what if you shift from this thing came to me versus this thing came through me right So for example for those of us who have been through really bad traumas right? Like let's say you were taken advantage of as a child. You did not deserve any of that. But what if that crisis didn't come, as long as it comes to you, it stops at you. Yeah. And so you have to harbor all those feelings and emotions. But the moment you say that childhood traumatic situation didn't come to my life, but it was meant to come through my life to somehow bless somebody else. the lessons the lessons if I can help other young girls not have to go through what I went through or if I can teach other young boys the signs the warning signs or if I can teach other kids this or that or the other or if I can teach other people in domestic violence situations it didn't come to me because if it comes to you it has to sit inside you but what if you have a pass through mindset that says it came through me to touch somebody else's life. Now it's passing by. So since it's passing by, while it's passing, I need to pick up the life lessons and the wisdom and the insight and the revelation, and then use that to bless other people. Yep. Woo! Come on, somebody. We got to shift. So those are three simple shifts that we could use to take it to a completely different level. Another shift that I love to talk about is is the importance of shifting from grinding to flow. I'll make this one short. I could go and do a whole illustration, but I'm not going to do that. But I just want to say this. We've been raised in this culture that says you got to grind, grind, grind, grind, grind. Get up at 4 a.m. and go to sleep at 12 midnight and just grind, grind, grind for your dream. And I believe in working hard. I do believe in having a really rock solid work ethic. I believe that's important. I believe what Will Smith says. He says, you might have more talent than me. You might have more money than you. me, but you won't outwork me, right? I believe that. I love something Kevin Hart says. He says, everybody wants to be famous, but nobody wants to put the work in. I agree with that, right? I agree that we got to work for what we really want. Does that make sense? But at the end of the day, I also believe that you don't have to grind to get what you want because grind is a sign of inappropriate transition between gears. Since we're talking about shifting into a higher gear, grind is a sign of inappropriate transition between gears. And so at the end of the day, we want to go from grinding to flow because nothing God created grinds. It flows. When you look up at the sun, it's not struggling to be hot. It ain't. It's having a good old time being hot by itself. It's just being. When you look at fish that are swimming through the ocean, in the sea, right? When you look at fish, are they struggling? If you look at fish in an aquarium and they're moving effortlessly. Do you see them grinding to do it? When you watch a bird fly, is it struggling? Yeah. It doesn't grind to do what it does. It flows. And my friend, you and I have to learn how to get into a flow. And when we learn how to find and foster and facilitate our flow, we can leave this world better than the way we found it. And I think those are three shifts we can make at the top of the year that will make an epic difference in our lives. Yeah, so the name of the book is called Shift into a Higher Gear, Better Your Best and Live Life to the Fullest. Shift into a Higher Gear, Better Your Best and Live Life to the Fullest. It's available in over 80 different online retailers all across the world, actually. Amazon, Barnes and Noble.com, Goodreads.com. You can get it everywhere. And it's also available on Audible, which I'm really, really excited about. And we actually went in studio, Dan, and recorded the audio ourselves. We didn't hire an actor. We had a chance to. But I told the publisher, I said, nah, let's not hire an actor. I really want to voice this project myself. So if you go on Audible and you love Audible, man, the audio book is sensational. Yeah, I got it. We've gotten rave reviews about it, and we're really, really pumped and excited about it. And we also created a companion workbook inspired by the book, which is also sensational. And you can get that at shiftintoahighergear.com. That's shiftintoahighergear.com, which I'm really, really excited about. And we're really, really grateful for it. And we also have online courses that I teach. One of the things that I do in addition to peak performance is I also teach presentation skills. And so I'm considered one of the top speaker trainers on the planet. And I have one of the only training programs that's been featured in both Toastmasters magazine and the National Speakers Association magazine. And I'm really, really grateful for that. And so we have a program that we created an online course called Crush Your Sales. And it's a 30 video online course that teaches you powerful persuasion skills that you can use in order to present more profoundly and sell and convert 10 times better. And so the website that people can go to to learn more about that, the name of the course is called Crush Your Sales. The website that people can go to learn more about is called CrushTheSale.com. It's called CrushTheSale.com. We weren't able to get the exact domain. I came up with the name first, and then I was like, I went to the domain. I was like, ah, I was taking it. I couldn't buy it. So I'm like, dang it. So anyway, so the name of the website is CrushTheSale.com, but the name of the course is called Crush Your Sales. And it's an incredible online course designed to teach you powerful, persuasive presentation skills so that you can convert your prospects into clients, paid clients and customers who want to work with you for years and years to come. So I'm really pumped and excited about that. And we're really, really grateful for that course and all the great impact that it's having on people all across the planet. We do a three day speaker training boot camp called Crush the Stage. and so we're really really excited about that and we host an annual conference called the full throttle experience and it's an incredible four-day conference that we do for high achievers it's experiential it's high energy and it's really really amazing so i love the work that we get a chance to do dan to help people discover and unlock their true potential well uh one question i did want to ask you that i didn't get a chance to ask you at the beginning is what what was if if you don't mind me asking what was your childhood like what was your upbringing Yeah. So I was born and raised in Tampa, Florida. I still live in Tampa to this day. I've traveled all over the planet, literally. But I've given over 4,000 paid talks all over the world. But I tell you, Tampa has always been home for me. I've lived in other parts of the country for like two or three years at a time. But I've always ended up coming back home to Tampa. My dad's here. My mom was here before she passed almost eight years ago. So my brother is here and my daughters are here. So I just tend to always find my way back to Tampa, the beaches and the sunshine. And just I just love it. So anyway. But yeah, a humble guy born and raised in Tampa, Florida. I was raised by two Christian parents. And my dad was a very, very big influence in my life. My father's been in a wheelchair and he's operated from wheelchair longer than I've been alive. I'm 44. And my father was shot in the upper back twice when he was 20. fighting for you and I in the Vietnam War. Left on the battlefield, true story, they took my dad and put him in a room full of dead soldiers. The only way they knew my dad was alive is because his eyes were blinking feverishly. And somebody said, grab that one, grab that one. And they pulled my dad out of that heap and rehabilitated him. And my dad could have sat back on a government check his whole life as a disabled veteran, but he didn't want to do that. He had great academics and he had great determination and great parents and a great faith-based background. He said, listen, I want to one day lead the same organization that helped to rehabilitate me. And my dad became the national director of the Paralyzed Veterans Association of America, creating policy for over 10 years for veterans all over the world. And so I'm so incredibly proud of him. So my dad really taught me tenacity, grit, fortitude, not quitting, not giving up when life hands you a permanent, a permanent challenge that you have to live the rest of your life with. And my dad was in the military for about a year total. So because he was injured so early in his military career, he got the Purple Heart, honorable discharge, everything, right? Right. My mom was a Sunday school teacher and an English teacher. If you were going to be Olivia's kid, you had to be able to talk. So from the time I was in the third, fourth and fifth grade, she gave me the longest parts in the Easter play, the Christmas play, You know, and so my mom really was big into diction and articulation. And so my mom really taught me how to speak and how to really communicate and kind of put myself out there. And when I got into college, I joined Toastmasters in college at the recommendation of one of my mentors at the time who passed away in 2015. His name was Dr. Lee Jones. And he was my first. My mom was my first mentor. I would easily say that Dr. Lee Jones was my second mentor, but he was my first professional mentor, even while I was in college. And so Dr. Lee Jones is who prepared me for a Les Brown when I got out of college because I met Les Brown and Dr. Willie Jolly within one year of graduating from Florida State. I was 21 when I met both of them. That's incredible. I was 21 when I met both of them. And I'm 44 now. And so that's 23 years ago. And so it's unbelievable. And so just an incredible journey that it's been. And I'm so very, very grateful and honored to have had these gentlemen in my life for that long. And so that's a little bit about my childhood and a little bit about my matriculation into getting into the industry as a speaker. So here's what's funny. So so so when Dr. Jones inspired me while I was still at Florida State, because I got two of my degrees from Florida State. I got my undergraduate degree in speech communication and I got my master's degree in instructional systems design, curriculum design and development. And so I came out of college knowing that speaking was a part of what I wanted to do because I had been listening to Zig Ziglar tapes and Tony Robbins CDs and all that stuff from the time I was 14, 15 years old. I was I was just drawn to personal development. True story. I remember being someone who, although I was raised in the church, I never felt like I was supposed to pastor. I just didn't feel like that was what I was called to do. And so I said, what do I do with this gift of speaking if I don't like pastor a church, if that's not what I feel called to do? And so I took a spiritual gifts inventory. And one of the things that it revealed is that my three greatest gifts were that of exhortation, leadership and administration, actually. So I was like, hmm. And the four, actually there was four of them, the gift of wisdom, the gift of exhortation, the gift of leadership and the gift of administration. Those are the four things that I scored highest on on my spiritual gifts inventory So I was like hmm so what do I do with this And so I went to one of my pastors at the time who helped me understand what exhortation meant And so I started taking those results of that. And I said, OK, I'm not going to necessarily, you know, pastor a church, but, you know, let me go. And so I got involved in Toastmasters and started competing and got involved in National Speakers Association. And those doors began to open for me. And then, you know, I started speaking. I was under I was under Les Brown's. I was in one of Les Brown's very first speaker trainings. And I went to that at his home. And that's how I got that's how I met Willie Jolly live. And Dr. Willie Jolly is now one of my closest friends and dearest mentors as well. And they both have taken me under their wing as a son. They really, truly have. And so I'm grateful for their leadership. But that's really what got me. I got strong mentorship in my life early and their standards of excellence were so high that there was no other option. I had to go out there and make something remarkable of the proximity that I had been blessed to receive. Yeah. Well, you're continuing their legacy. Thank you, man. That means a lot. I really appreciate that. I have one final question, too. You talk in the book about kicking back the kickstand. Actually, this resonates with me because I was just talking about that. And it shifted to a higher gear. And, you know, I always had a kickstand myself where I'm trying to kick it down, but it always came back up. Back up, yep. So here's what's amazing, right? And so just to kind of show people what you're talking about is chapter five in the book, right? Chapter five in the book is called shift from excuses to powerful declarations because you cannot ride with the kickstand down. Shift from excuses to powerful declarations because you cannot ride with the kickstand down. And one of the things that we teach in the book is this is simply this. the purpose of a kickstand is to support the motorcycle when the motorcycle is not in use. So if we just slow that down, the purpose of a kickstand is to support the motorcycle when the motorcycle is not in use. So if your excuse is a kickstand, the purpose of the excuse is to support your life when your life is not in use. Support your business when your business is not in use. Support your brand when your brand is not in use. To support your body, if you decide not to go exercise today, guess what? Your excuse supported you, but guess what? Your body wasn't in use that day. You didn't really use your body. You didn't exercise it. You didn't get the cardio. And I'm not judging. I'm not pointing any fingers. I still got to work on that every day, getting on my Peloton bike, every day doing my cardio, right? Sometimes we just get busy with business, but I've learned to put accountability partners around me. to hold me accountable. And then I ended up going to the gym with other people. So it's more of a fun thing instead of like, oh, I have to go. I get to go. And I get to go with friends, right? So I had to work on that kickstand too. And I think it's something everybody, right, you know, works on. And so at the end of the day, what we have to understand is that the purpose of the kickstand is to support you. So your excuses are going to feel good to you because the goal is to support you. But the problem is it supports you when the bike of your life is not in use. And here's what's amazing about the kickstand. The kickstand has a kill safe mechanism built into it. So when you drop that kickstand on a motorcycle, it stalls the engine because the kickstand tells the motorcycle the rider is not ready to ride. Dan, I'm going to say it again. The kickstand tells the motorcycle that the rider is not ready to ride. Yeah So when you're using When you're using excuses You can't use your life So I love something that Jim Rohn said He said you can make money or you can make excuses But you can't make both You can make money or you can build your business You can't do both You can make excuses or you can build your marriage You can't do both You can make excuses or you can really empower your children You can't do both You can make excuses Right Or you can really start to put yourself out there on social media like you want to. You can't do both. So at this point, my friend, you have to choose ye this day which one you will serve. Are you going to serve excuses or are you going to serve execution? It's really up to you. And one of the things that I encourage people to do in that chapter is to say, listen, replace those excuses with declarations. Speak into existence what it is that you want. Decree a thing and it shall be established. So we have to understand how excuses are used and how we got to get out of those excuses so that that way we can get into the powerful declarations and live our lives at a completely different place. And one of the things that I thought we could do, Dan, I want to give everybody a gift for just listening to the broadcast today. I want every one of y'all who's listening to do me a favor. If you've been enjoying this content and if you've made the decision that this is your year to shift into a higher gear, I want to help you with that. So I want to give you a simple action step to take. Number one, I want you to text, grab your phone right now, and I want you to text the word SHIFT to 647-558-9895. I want you to text the word SHIFT to 647-558-9895. That's all I want you to do is just text the word SHIFT to that number. As soon as you do that, it's going to send you an automatic message back asking you for your best email address. You type your email address in, send that back, and then within five minutes, you will have in your inbox, in your inbox, an eight-part video series from me that we filmed live in Costa Rica called Leaning Into Excellence. It's an absolutely incredible eight-part video series. Dan, I'm sure you've probably already started enjoying it. I've seen it. Oh, yes. That's teaching you how to deconstruct excellence. Dan, people are messaging me. They say, look, I've never heard someone break down excellence like this before. Dan, what did you think of the series? I thought it was incredible. And not to bring this back up again, but Crush the Sales was phenomenal. It's just absolutely phenomenal. I've learned so much just, you know, from you. Thank you. And I wish I knew you a long time ago. 20 years ago, right? Exactly. We're really excited about all the things that we're doing to help people. And if you're enjoying this broadcast and you want to continue to discover your potential, my friend, I really want to challenge you to do it together. Do it in a group. So we have an incredible Facebook group. Go to Facebook and type in Global Biker Posse. Just type in the Global Biker Posse. That's our online community of everybody who's reading this book, shifting to a higher gear. We have a Global Biker Posse of people all over the country and around the world who are reading this book, loving this book, and getting great value from the book. So just join that community, and we do book clubs in that community. We do special exclusive content in that community. It's really, really inspiring, and we're really excited about all the great stuff that's happening in that community. So I want you to be a part of that. If you're listening to this and you represent a company or organization and you'd like to bring us in for speaking engagements, please visit our primary website. That's Dellatoro.com. D-E-L-A-T-O-R-R-O, D-E-L-A-T-O-R-R-O.com. Visit our primary website, delatoro.com, and you'll be able to learn all about how to book us for speaking engagements or training for your corporation, your association, for your ministry, for your nonprofit organization. So we're really, really excited about all the great things, Dan, that are happening. And we use all those platforms to help people discover their potential and take their lives to the next level. If you'd like to listen to great podcasts, the name of our podcast is called Crushing Life with Delatoro. So find us on your favorite podcasting platform, Crushing Life with Del Toro. You'll enjoy our podcast. Everybody says every podcast episode is like a freaking seminar. It's so content rich. And we do solo podcast episodes as well as guest interview podcast episodes as well. So you'll enjoy Crushing Life with Del Toro. So, y'all, I want to help you discover your potential and live it out to the fullest. And I really believe that this new book will definitely take you there. And Dan, you wait, man. When you get the workbook, oh, my God, it's a whole different experience because now you'll be able to really chop up. You'll be able to just kind of put chapter one here and you grab your workbook and work through those exercises. And, man, they're so comprehensive and they're so powerful to teach you so many other additional great lessons about the book. So it's a really perfect addendum to the book. And so we're really excited about that. People can get the workbook at shiftintoahighergear.com. I'm going to do this for my listeners. whoever gets the book you know we were going to give out some free books but whoever gets the book and takes a picture with the book and does a a selfie i will and you send it to me i will send i will get the workbook for them and send it to them wow so if whoever comes in you know like let's say the first five people that come in i'll try to push them the workbook so if you send an email to Cindy. This is my mom's former email address, but Cindy, which we need to change, but Cindy at CindyGilman.com. I will personally send, get the workbook and purchase the workbook for them. And again, we don't have sponsors. So we're incredible. That's an incredible gift. You also make sure you take advantage of that. I cannot underscore how important that is. And it's so funny. And this is why I want you guys to, here's another reason why you want to make sure that you you visit the shift into a higher gear.com website is because you can download some of the book bonuses from that page and one of those book bonuses is a pdf printout of the actual declarations that you need to replace your excuses with and so it's a really really cool free pdf that we give you so uh dan i think you and i are great because we're in partnership to help people discover and develop their potential to the fullest and that's what it's all about brother so i'm excited Yeah, it's about touching other people's lives and actually making them go into high gear. That's right, man. This is the year that we shifted to a high gear. Come on, somebody. Yeah, it is. It is. It is. It's great. Well, thank you so much. I know you have to go now, but thank you so much for being here today. And as my mother always said, do something nice for yourself, but do something nice for others. Amen. Absolutely. honor your amazing mother she did a sensational job with you and you're making her proud each and every day so know that dan and i love you my friend i'm looking forward to nothing but great things to come this is cindy gilman and you're listening to discover your potential so until next time do something nice for yourself but do something nice for someone else