FULL TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to another episode of the exEXPERTS DIVORCE etc… Podcast where we give you all kinds of information and tips on everything divorce. Why? We’ve lived it, so we get it! We’re T.H. & Jessica. 

Jessica: Welcome to today’s episode of Divorce etc. I am so excited. We have literally one of my favorite people in the whole wide world on the podcast today.

T.H.: And now one of my favorite people.

Dan: [Gasp] Ooh, I feel so loved.

Jessica: I’m fully obsessed with Dan Shaal, and in full disclosure, and his wife Kami and his whole family. But I’ve known Dan now probably about I would say, sevenish…five to seven years?

Dan: Fiveish?

Jessica: Fiveish? Okay. And he is absolutely wonderful. One of the things that he is doing now and why we’re having him on the podcast is because he has become a Gallup-certified CliftonStrengths coach. He has a new course, a new program called Thriving Relationships, and it’s for women leaders. It’s basically about using your strengths in order to build these authentic relationships. It is so valuable for all of you guys listening, particularly those of us who have gone through a divorce, to learn more about ourselves, learn more about enhancing all of the relationships in our lives with your ex, with your kids, with your family, with your colleagues and co-workers. So, Dan, thank you for being on today.  

Dan: This is just so cool. I just love what the two of you are doing–

T.H.: Thank you!

Dan: –to give you some props. I’ve been sharing it with a few of my friends who are recently divorced, and they’ve shared just how beneficial it’s been to have this platform. So you two are doing amazing work for people out there.

T.H.: Thank you.

Jessica: So for everyone listening, okay, you’re a relationship coach. You have this program called Thriving Relationships. It’s about using your CliftonStrengths. I mean tell us exactly what all of that means so that people really understand what we’re talking about.  

Dan: Sure. So Clifton Strengths, I was introduced to it a few years ago through a network marketing company I was working with. I invested in it, and I learned about it. I thought you know what, I’m going to get coached in this so I understand how I can best use my god-given natural talents that I’ve had, to become a better business person. What I discovered was that it was way more than that. I actually didn’t like the business part of it. It kind of bored me. I was really interested in how it changed me, and how it changed how I thought about myself. It changed the way I saw my wife, and I saw what her strengths were. And the things that would make me annoyed, I go, why do you do this all the time? It’d just drive me bonkers. When I was researching, I was going, oh my god, she can’t help it. It’s just how you’re wired. One of the cool things is when you get your report after the assessment, there’s a DNA–it looks like a DNA strand at the top of the report. And so this is your DNA. It’s what you’re made of. I was like I’ve got to become a coach. I need to become a coach. So about a year later, I became a coach. It’s been 18 months now, I’ve coached hundreds of people, and the thing that really stuck out to me was the improvements people were making, and who they really were. They were coming out of their shell. They were appreciating themselves more. They were seeing improved relationships, mostly with their spouses and their families, because that’s their direct inner circle. But then I started branching out to how does this work with the people you work with, and how is this with the people over here and over there? I was obsessed with it. And so I changed my whole playbook from business coaching to relationship coaching. And through brainstorming for the past six months before I launched this program, there are three really big areas where people have a lot of trouble with relationships.

One is miscommunication. You’re speaking different languages. If a person one is speaking this language, and person two speaks this language, there’s this constant friction, constant fighting. You don’t understand me, and I don’t understand you. Forget it, we’re done with it.

Jessica: And that’s so important I think for anyone who’s gone through a divorce because there’s no question that anytime a marriage has broken down, a huge part of the issue is miscommunication. And so to be able to learn that about yourself, how you can do things differently moving forward and based on what you know your own strengths can be, I think it’s just a valuable resource.

T.H.: And it’s miscommunication, but a lack of communication. You might be speaking the same language, but you might not be speaking at all. Do you know what I mean? So there may be zero engagement, which definitely was the case in the last few years of my official married life. There was no communication. It wasn’t misunderstood. It just wasn’t happening. And that is a huge problem for any relationship.

Jessica: For sure. What are the other things?

Dan: The other thing is–a second one is like a bull in a china shop, where someone comes on so strong. We call them blind spots.

The assessment calls them blind spots where you’re just so unaware of what you’re doing. You think you’re doing everything fine, but the people around you are like, oh my gosh, you’re too much. And so teaching people those boundaries, teaching people when to back off and recognize, oh, people are uncomfortable around me because I’m doing this to the extreme.

Jessica: I want to…

T.H.: I hope you’re going to say, well, I’m going to ask.

Jessica: Well, I really want to get to the third thing, but I want to say, and we can get back to this, which is there are so many messages out there, in particular, when you have gotten divorced, where people are like, listen, you’re not for everyone, but your person is going to love you for who you are. Listen, I’m super high energy. I’m sure there are a lot of people out there who are like, whoa, Jessica, you’re way too much. But I also feel if I’m too much for someone, that’s not my person. We can put a pin in it there and hear what the other thing is and come back. But I just felt compelled to say that, because what you’re going to tell us is maybe a really interesting parallel to things that we’ve already heard, that we really need to learn, and people haven’t heard before.

Dan: Sure. And then the third thing is people masking or hiding who they really are. They’ve been either whatever the circumstance may be, whatever happened in the past, someone has or something has caused them to just suppress their strengths. They hide them for fear of being ridiculed, embarrassed, or uncomfortable. They had a failure using their strengths at one point so, like, I’m never doing that again, because I tried it last time, and it sucked. It didn’t work out well. But it’s building positive connections to the strength and looking back at past successes so people will say, you know what, I shouldn’t hide who I am. I should be proud of who I am. I should look at this strength and be like, oh, wait I need to honor this strength. I call it honoring your strengths. You have to honor who you are. So teaching people, hey, this is good when I do it this way. I should be proud of who I am. I’m not going to hide any longer and just say, hey world, this is who I am.  

T.H.: Also, another perspective with that, because that definitely happened to me, you lose yourself in a relationship where you are belittled and just disrespected. You’re almost gaslighted to believe that your strengths are not your strengths. Your strengths are your weaknesses, and you are not who you think you are. So coming out of any kind of trauma, and it doesn’t have to be divorce, any kind of serious breakup or change, you certainly are going to question yourself, your qualities. Are your values even good? Is my perspective even right? Is my gut even honest? So when I spoke to Dan and I got the lowdown, I was like, holy shit, this is awesome. You can do this for yourself.

Dan: We can curse here?

Jessica: Dan, this is my show. Come on!

T.H.: You are now permitted to curse.

Dan: Okay, good. I didn’t want to curse before.

T.H.: But it was really inspiring to relearn…well, maybe it’s to learn about yourself for the first time because maybe you never really knew yourself. Or the person you are today is not exactly the person you were. I feel like I am so much the person I was but with more experience, except for a few years in the middle. But I think that this whole assessment that we’re all going to share with all of you in a few minutes is very revealing and interesting. You can take what you want from it. But it’s really empowering to see things on here and be like, damn straight, that’s exactly who I am!  So I think it’s awesome.

Jessica: And I will also say, and we know the statistics and there are so many people that come out of unhappy marriages from places of trauma and from mentally and emotionally abusive relationships and more, and as a person who fortunately has never encountered that, that wasn’t the case in any of my relationships in the past, but I just want everyone else to know I totally lost myself in my second marriage. It wasn’t even about, like I said, that kind of trauma and sort of hiding myself. It just came to a point where I was like it’s almost not worth speaking up. It’s just almost not worth expressing my opinion, because that’s going to turn into some kind of an argument, or that’s going to create anxiety, or that’s just going to go down a bad road, and I don’t really feel like getting stuck in the wormhole right now. So I just stopped talking. And everybody that knows me knows that me not talking and speaking my mind is totally not who I am. It has taken me a while to regain my confidence in who I actually am, and feel more like myself. That’s why I love so much what it is that you’re doing, Dan, and why at for everybody else that we’re bringing this to you. Because it’s really is crucial skills for when you’ve come out of a place and you’re questioning so much about yourself, and how to move forward with yourself.

Dan: This is something that I never intended this direction, honestly. I didn’t understand the power of what these conversations lead to, where my clients were focusing on just becoming better business people and how to build a team and a strategy, whatever.

And then they were just revealing the depth of information they got about who they really were. And yeah, there are a lot of tears. As you said T.H., there’s trauma. They had trauma in their life, and they push that strength that should have been something they’ve been focusing on all their life.

They were told you stink at it, it’s bad, or whatever and they just put it aside. Then they work on doing the bottom strengths. They go, oh, the world tells me I should be doing it this way. So this strength here, I should just shut up and mind my Ps and Qs, and stay in my lane, and just do this because that’s what the world thinks. But in reality, you’re slowly dying inside when you’re not living your strengths.  

T.H.: And it’s very freeing when you come out and challenge whoever is giving you that negative messaging. I mean, I had finally stood up to…I can’t say who it is, but it wasn’t my ex, because that’s where it came from, from when I was really young. And all of a sudden, I heard the message differently because I was in a better place. I was like, wait a second. You’re not talking to me. You’re saying I’m doing what? It’s amazing that when you understand yourself, the same thing could have been said to you two million times, but the 2,000,001 time, when you understand what your strength is, that message no longer works. You see and hear how wrong they are, and it is offensive. And you’re going to speak up. But it takes time, everybody. I mean, I’m 51. This is like in the last 10 years, okay? A lot has changed. But that is the power of this. So great, now you know your strengths. What are you going to do with it?

Jessica: Well, let’s let Dan show us that.

T.H.: Yeah.

Dan: Who do you want to start with?

Jessica: Well, I’ll just say my strengths, because I have kind of been down this road before. And also, it’s more about him figuring out what T.H.’s strengths were based on their initial conversation. But just to put it out there, my top five strengths, and for everyone again listening, these are the CliftonStrengths based on the Gallup…study? I don’t know what it’s called.

Dan: It’s their assessment.

Jessica: The Gallup assessment.

Dan: You might hear some words, and one of the issues a lot of people have is they don’t do the research or look into it deeper. They attach the Webster dictionary definition to the strength and they have a big misinterpretation of it. So please don’t just look at it at face value. You have to actually read the report and look at the information behind it so you have a clearer picture and understanding, and don’t just jump to conclusions.

Jessica: That’s totally true, because the words that we say, that’s not what they mean necessarily in this context. So it is important to really look it up if you’re actually going to take the Gallup strengths test and get your CliftonStrengths. So my top five Gallup strengths are Activator, Maximizer, Positivity, Woo, and Communication. We can put a pin in that and let’s–

T.H.: Those all go under the title of Influencing, right?

Dan: Four of the five are Influencing strengths, yes. Shall I go into the four categories of strengths to let people know? Would that be a beneficial thing?

T.H.: Sure. Yeah.

Dan: In a nutshell, there are 34 of them, and they break them into four categories. Influencing, it’s like how you then get people to do something. How do you move people? How do you influence them to do what you want them to do? There are Relationship Building strengths. It’s like who do you connect with, and how do you connect with them? How do you build those relationships? There are Executing strengths, and basically, it’s how you get shit done. How do you like to get it done? And what makes it work for you? And then the last one is Strategic Thinking. It’s like how do you absorb information? How do you process information? What’s the motivation behind that? Where do you get those things from? That’s like how the brain stuff works. So Jessica has four of her top five in influencing. Just to put that out there.

Jessica: I’m an influencer, people!

Dan: Yeah, baby!

T.H.: Okay, let’s hear what you think mine are based on–Dan and I had a conversation before this podcast, and he’s like, I already know what they’re going to be. So let’s see if he got me right.

Dan: And we had about an hour conversation and I took a guess. Do you want what I thought your top 10 would be?

T.H.: Sure.

Dan: Alright. So I thought her top 10 based upon our interview: Achiever, Input, which is like I need information, Intellection, which is all about thinking and processing, Belief, like really strong morals and values and very, very firm boundaries–

T.H.: I’m getting a little nervous that none of those–

Dan: Oh gosh. Responsibility – you take a lot of responsibility, Relator, which means you like to have deep relationships with people, Communication, because you’re kick ass speaker, Learner because I sense you to read and learn and absorb information, Strategic, because you love planning, and Futuristic, which means, ‘I see the future’, ‘I have a vision of what life’s going to look like’. Now, again, it sounds like I was totally off, which is okay. I’m okay with that.

T.H.: You’re not totally off. I was just looking for the ones you said that–

Jessica: What are your top five strengths, T.H.?

T.H.: Individualization is number one.

Dan: You know, when I was writing that, when I was thinking of this earlier, I thought I should have put that in there. Because that’s about finding the unique traits with each individual person, like how they’re special.  

T.H.: Number two is Futuristic, which is a conflict for me because I really feel that I’ve been so present.

Jessica: But that’s not what it means.

Dan: No.

T.H.: So what does that mean? I have a big picture?

Dan: You have a big picture. You look and say I have goals for the future. I can picture and visualize this is where I’m going to be at this time. It could be tomorrow, next week, next month, 10 years down the road, but you think about the future, and how the future is going to be like a certain way.

T.H.: So that means my number one is in Relationship Building. My number two is in Strategic Thinking. My number three is in Influencing as Communication. My number four is in Executing with Focus.

Dan: Goal setting, that’s goals. Goals, goals, goals.

T.H.: It’s interesting for me, yeah. And number five is Woo.

Dan: Oh, Woo, that’s Influencing.

Jessica: We’re both Woo!

Dan: Woo: Wins Others Over.

Jessica: And we’re both Communication.

Dan: Winning Others Over.

Jessica: That’s what Woo stands for.

Dan: Social charm, you have charisma, and people flock to you when you have high Woo.

T.H.: Alright, well, to have high Woo is good.

Dan: Yeah, absolutely.

Jessica: So that’s interesting those are your top five, but quickly read off your next five to see where Dan was on his.

T.H.: So number six is Activator under Influencing. Seven is Relator under Relationship Building. Number eight is Belief in Executing. Number nine is Ideation in Strategic Thinking. And number 10 is Input in Strategic Thinking.

Jessica: So you weren’t that far off Dan. It sounds like you have like half of them.

T.H.: I have as much Strategic Thinking as Influencing.

Dan: So when I coach people, just to give you guys, in a nutshell, we look at your top 10. And we look at what’s your dominant domain. Like, what domain do you lead with? So you had what was it…three and three?

T.H.: Yeah.

Dan: So three Relationship Building and…no.

T.H.: No, three Strategic Thinking, three Influencing.

Dan: Which means you influence people with your brain. With your information, you can move people with your Futuristic and Ideation. You’re creative, and the way you share that with people inspires them. It activates and motivates them to do and get into action. So you Woo them with you all that information, plus your social charm, and then people start to do stuff. Activator is like let’s get this shit started, basically. 

T.H.: So then we do complement each other?

Dan: Yeah. Well, think about this. Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

Jessica: No, I was going to say, I feel hearing mine and hearing T.H.’s, it might be interesting to give a real-world practical example of–look, T.H. and I have a relationship. We have a working relationship. We’re co-founders of this business. We work together every day. We have to agree on what we’re doing. What’s the direction that we’re taking? What are the colors going to be? What’s the logo going to look like? What is our branding? What kind of topics do we want to cover? All of these things. And I will speak for myself by saying that I feel our working relationship has been fairly easy. We seem to have fallen into the categories that probably feed our strengths best. I come from a media TV production background, T.H. comes from experiential events and marketing background, so we have taken on tasks without having to sit down and really hash out who’s doing what. I feel like our working relationship is pretty smooth. And yeah, I’m curious to know, based on our strengths, does that sound natural to you that yes, because our strengths work off of each other, of course, that’s what our relationship is, or how would we utilize our strengths better?

Dan: I think because you’ve been friends for so long and you understand each other, you allowed each other to breathe in your air, your zone of genius. It wasn’t Jessica coming in and saying you’ll do it this way, or T.H. coming in saying you’ll do it this way. You allowed each other to have their spot where they can shine. Like I think you said Jess, you had that media presence. So that’s Influencing. You had to charm people, you had to speak well, and you’re around a lot of people. If you were a blubbering idiot, no one would listen to you, right? You would lose all the credibility you had. So your communication has to be high. You have to think quickly on your feet. Activator is thinking quickly on your feet. Just go. Just go. Eff it, and let’s move. We’ll figure it out as we go. Imagine if you guys were dwelling in this, [gasp] oh my gosh, we can’t do anything until it’s perfect. Oh my gosh. Do you think exEXPERTS would be launched by now? It’d be still on the production floor. You’d have quit by now.

Jessica: I know. But we do talk about the whole analysis paralysis. Sometimes we talk about things ad nauseam, and I’m like, let’s just fuck it. Let’s just book it. We got to go. We got to just try it and see what happens.  

Dan: That’s right. And that’s what helps you both. You’re not conflicting. You’re not one person that’s holding one back. But having both have Activator high, like, we’ll do it, we understand the risks, but let’s just go for it. T.H. has the Ideation and the Futuristic, that’s the creative side. It’s creative. She’s got the creative energy. She has the information. The Input, the Ideation, and the Futuristic are all about, [gasp] I’ve got an idea. Let’s go with it. And you’re like, like you said, fuck it, let’s do it.

Jessica: More I’m like shut the fuck up because I can’t keep up with all your ideas.

Dan: Or that’s what you do. When you learn all of your strengths and then you look at what your bottom strengths are, you can see how sometimes you do the wrong thing or how you have to counterbalance it. So the way a working relationship works, a positive successful relationship, is honoring that person and allowing them to be in that space without being critical, without trying to squash them or shame them or demean them.

Also, don’t allow them to walk all over you. That’s really important. You can’t be like, hey, I know you like to do that, but you’re going too far now, and respecting the other person’s point of view. So creating that language where you want for yourself to know how you should be acting in a certain way, but also for the other person, you now have this information. You have the inside scoop on T.H.’s head, right? You know what she’s really thinking. So you can say, oh, that’s your Futuristic going a little wild, and sometimes I’ve got to bring it back to Earth. Hey, Earth to T.H. We can’t really do that. You know that, right? We have to actually be on Earth, not in the clouds. So maybe she does that sometimes, and you just say, enough of the thinking, let’s get to work. Because people who have Ideation high, Futuristic high, can get lost, so you have to be able to say at a certain point, I know you’re in your brain right now, but we have to actually get something done right now. And it’s because you’re friends, you’d say it in a way that wouldn’t be rude or condescending or patronizing. You’d be like, thank you for reminding me. We’re cool. Let’s hit that. Let’s get to work.  

T.H.: That’s why I think from the very beginning it just worked for us to support one another when we were even separating. We didn’t even realize how valuable we were for one another until we were really separating, because Jessica is a really good listener. I was not always a great listener. I was a fixer. So I was already 10 steps ahead before someone could get the words out of their mouth. I’ve trained myself to be much better. I still do that sometimes, because I want to get the word in! I want to get the word in! And I make the excuse that, well, I’m going to forget if I don’t get the word in. But the truth is I’m not going to forget. I just want to get the word in. But we communicate really well. We respect one another’s expertise, which is what I think you said about honoring one another, which is so important in so many relationships. Now I think about the friends that I’ve chosen because I’ve eliminated so many, people who I really do honor, I have significant respect for them. And so I’m able to support them properly and they can support me because we give that to one another. I think that that’s everything. Otherwise, you have to demand it. If you’re not getting it, then maybe that’s not someone to be friends or relationship or whatever with. But I want to ask you another question, because I’m like, what about the weaknesses? And you don’t call them weaknesses, you call them…what do you call them?

Dan: Lesser strengths or bottom strengths.

T.H.: Lesser strengths. The funniest thing is that’s number 34. Do you want to know what my less-est strength is?

Dan: Uh-huh.

T.H.: Harmony.

Dan: Okay.

T.H.: Oh no! [Laughs]  

Dan: There’s nothing wrong with that.

T.H.: You don’t have to sugarcoat it. Let’s hear it.

Dan: When you have Harmony high, and I’m going to just go that way, Harmony high in a good way is you’re able to see both sides of the story or both sides of the argument. You are able to then be a great mediator. You’re a mediator that brings peace to a situation. Okay, so that’s kind of a quality Harmony trait. When Harmony is 34, there are a couple of ways it can go. One is you could try really, really, really, really hard to bring the peace, which makes you a doormat. Which just to avoid any kind of conflict, you’re like, I really don’t want to have any conflict, so I try really, really hard. You can become a doormat for somebody else. Or the other extreme is you have literally like, I don’t give a fuck what you think, attitude. I’m going to do what I want to do. So it can go either way. Then people are like, oh my gosh. You’re like no I don’t care what you think. I really don’t care what you think. I’m doing whatever I’m doing, and that’s your problem. That’s not my problem.

T.H.: Yeah, that’s fairly accurate.

Jessica: Listen, the idea of this type of a program, I mean, there’s something literally in it for everyone, right? Because of the learning that you’re doing on yourself by being able to identify your own personal strengths, and really reading what they mean–you guys, everybody listening, I remember when I first found out my top strengths, and when I read the definitions of all of them, and I read my full assessment, it was like someone was a psychic or something. It was so accurate. Because of the assessment tests that you take, it almost seems like it’s these totally random questions like, would you rather sweep out your closet or go to Disney World? The questions are so random, but really, they are so meaningful. It’s totally self-learning by being able to give yourself the gift of a program like this. But I want to ask you, Dan, for everyone who’s in a relationship who wants to move forward with a course like this, anyone who does it on their own is then going to understand why their partner needs to do it. But what are your thoughts on whether or not–is it something that you would more suggest that people do at the same time together, or that you would have one do before the other?  

Dan: So what I’ve discovered, typically what I’ve gotten from my coaching business is that the women have already done it before. They’re trying to convince their husbands to take it.

The husbands are like I don’t want you to judge me. You’re going to judge me. And so it’s a hard sell for a lot of guys because it just kind of is what my experience is. If both parties haven’t taken it yet, and they’re totally new to this, I say they both take it at the same time and discover it together. And I’ve got some ideas on how they should do it together. I mean, I don’t want to go into details here, but there are plans and strategies. I have little ebooks that people can use to guide them through the process, note-taking, and what to look for so that they can share. You’ve got to learn yourself, and then you have to learn your partner.

Jessica: It’s almost like the Love Languages.

Dan: Yes, absolutely. My wife and I were talking about it. Kami and I were talking about all the things we did. Literally, I did the Myers Briggs, I did the DiSC, I did the Enneagram, I did the Love Languages. And she was like you can’t take this test too! I’m like, why the fuck am I taking all these tests? I don’t want any more tests. I know I’m a nine in this and in that, whatever my things were, but this was the most comprehensive life-changing assessment. Everything else was sort of like a funny little, oh, that’s cool. I’m a nine, big deal. It’s like a hobby type of thing. This was like, oh my god. As you said, Jess, someone was in my head. Someone took the thoughts out of my head, put them into paper, into form, and I went [gasp] that’s who I really am. Like, oh my gosh, why don’t I do that more? I said to myself, why don’t I do this more?

T.H.: Mhmm. I also think that this could help you even if your partner doesn’t do it–

Jessica: Right, for sure.

Dan: Yes, absolutely.

T.H.: –even if you’re not in a relationship, just to discover yourself. Because through therapy, I learned that, okay, I can’t change that person. No one can change anybody. People can only grow themselves. I needed to learn how to respond to that, or not respond to that. By understanding your strengths, or your lesser strengths, you can learn that those words aren’t going to hurt me anymore because I’m going to respond in this way because this is my strength. And that’s kind of how this all comes together for me is it was less about me and more about what I was not–it’s like unlearning bad behavior, unlearning patterns that have grown and developed in negative ways. So you have to unlearn that first, dial it back, and then grow from there. I couldn’t grow until I took away the bad, you know, shed that bad weight.

Dan: You’re relearning yourself. It is a totally new discovery. And what happens is, and I’ve seen this a few times, the people around you are not comfortable with this new person. Who are you? What’s this new person? I discovered who I am, so I don’t care what you think. So that’s kind of how it works.

T.H.: Great. This is who I am. I don’t even know if I like you anymore, by the way.

Dan: Right. Yeah. And there’s so much more depth we can go into it. I know time is of the essence here. I don’t want to overwhelm people.

Jessica: But look, for everyone listening, as you’ve heard, I mean, there’s so much information here that is going to be so beneficial for you on your own journey. That’s what this is all about. Especially if you’ve gone through or are going through the process of a divorce, it’s all about self-discovery. It’s all about figuring out how to move forward in your best way and be your true authentic self. Because there is a very likely possibility that you haven’t been feeling or aren’t feeling like you are your best version of yourself. We are all about helping people on that path to get to that place so that when all the dust dies down, you really are in a better place, and you’re happier, and you’re feeling more fulfilled, and you’re ready to be able to literally live your best life.

T.H.: It’s also a very safe and private way for you to slowly take those baby steps we talk about all the time. Be totally honest, which is probably the hardest thing to do in taking this assessment. I had a bunch of neutrals because I couldn’t pick one. I was like, well, it depends on the circumstance. I might go right, or I could go left. So be honest, and look at it in your time as you’re ready. This is the perfect first step into your new life, or your new direction, your new opportunity. Then you do with it as you want. And then if you want more, you reach out to Dan, and you grow it, and you work on how to strengthen other strengths and not worry about the lesser strengths, and how to use them properly so that you can be the best you, no matter what’s happening in your life. It’s not going to be fantastic if you aren’t fantastic with yourself. And so this is just a great easy, low impact actual tool that we 100% endorse.

Dan: The last thing before we sign off is the three steps with this journey, it’s a very simplistic way to say it, but learn your strengths first. You have to learn them, then you have to love them, and then you live them. Don’t jump to living it before you–you have to learn what they are and what they truly mean and appreciate who you are. Embrace them, love them, love yourself, and then you’ll learn how to apply them and live them and use them in your relationships, in all of the things you’re doing. Everything in this world is relationship-based. You can’t escape people. And right now, besides the divorced population, it sucks right now. Going back into the world, we’re introduced to new situations. It’s not 2019 any longer. We can never go back to that stage. We can never go back to the way it was. This is a new way of living and we have to get back into building relationships that are going to benefit us. We’ve been beaten down, and we feel like crap. A lot of friendships have been broken. Family relationships have been broken because of what’s happened in the last two years. This could sort of either heal those relationships or just give you the confidence to say, I’m doing what I need to do to move forward.

Jessica: Right. Right.

T.H.: Awesome.

Jessica: Well, we’re big fans, so thank you so much again Dan for taking the time. Everybody listening, there’s a page on the website www.exexperts.com, and obviously, this podcast will be on there and the company information and a whole page on Dan. It’ll have all links to the program and what we love about it. We highly recommend going to check it out. We’ll keep you posted on the progress.

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