An Army of Normal Folks - Michael Lignos: The Ultimate Army Member (Pt 1)

Episode Date: October 8, 2024

Michael has been inspired to volunteer with, donate to, and reach out to 9 different Army members featured on the podcast! Frankly, this normal dude inspires us and we cannot wait for you to meet him.Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/premiumSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As a consultant, I look for ways, you know, typically it's the same way in a company, right? You have silos of functionality, you know, finance doesn't talk to sales and sales doesn't talk to manufacturing, right? And so my job is to bring them together and hopefully help them to perform at a higher level. So I just I think I have an instinctive mind to say, hey, I see two things that put together would be better. And so that's just the way I work. Every time I listen to a podcast, like my mind is thinking like either how do I get involved? Or how can this help this? I was in Starbucks, I wanted a blueberry muffin, and they said they were out but there were blueberry muffins sitting in the case and he's like, oh, I can't sell you those. I had just listened to the Farmlink podcast two days before and I'm like, how can we get these muffins? These muffins have

got to be edible, right? They can't be. How can we get these muffins out to the hungry people that need them? I mean, that's just the way my mind works. to the hungry people that need them. I mean, that's just the way my mind works. Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father, I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach in inner city Memphis.

And that last part, it somehow led to an Oscar for the movie about our team. That thing is called undefeated. I believe our country's problems will never be solved by a bunch of fancy people in nice suits using big words that nobody ever uses on CNN and Fox, but rather by an army of normal folks, us. Just you and me saying, hey you know what, maybe I can help. That's what Michael Lignis, the voice you just heard is done. Michael is just like you. He's a listener and it's inspired him to volunteer with, donate to, and interact with nine different charities that we featured on the podcast. It's awesome.

I cannot wait for you to hear from Michael right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. ["The New York Times"] Michael Ligness, how are you? I'm great. Happy to be here in Memphis. Flew in this morning? Last night.

Last night? Yeah. From? Atlanta, Georgia. 45 minute quick Delta shock. Just going, you don't even have to connect. That's right. It's the most beautiful thing in the world.

Did you like our new airport? I did. It's actually pretty. We were pretty impressed when we came in. We were like, wow, this is pretty snappy. Yeah, and who you got over here with you? I got my wife, beautiful wife, Sherry, with me. 23 years.

23 years married, but together 36. What took you so long? That's 13 years. That's another story. We'll do another podcast on that. Golly. We'll talk about it in the coming hours. Maybe I'm going the wrong way.

Sherry was discerning for 13 years. I bet that was the deal. Yeah, it was all Sherry, wasn't it? Yeah. So you're a different kind of guest for us. And when Alex suggested we do this, I was like, of course, duh, this makes so much sense. So spoiler alert, Michael is here because he listens to the podcast.

Michael is here because he's a guy who we're going to find out his story, but he is an average normal guy who started listening to the podcast and through the podcast has gotten involved with a number of things we've formally told stories about. And you are quintessentially the metaphorical example of what we want to reach millions of in this country. And frankly, your story inspires me. It keeps it makes me want to keep doing these shows every week. Because if there's Michael Lignis out there, there's got to be millions others. And so when learning about you, I want

you to know you inspired me. And my hope is that you inspire all of our other listeners and inspire listeners to help us find more listeners to actually get involved. So to set it up, I'm going to read you what you wrote to me. Okay. Okay. And I believe this was on February 2nd of this year at 619 AM. So you were awake early and you wrote bill because as you know I say on every show if you email me reach out I'll respond and you wrote bill I

read your article on Sunday and God post since reading it I've listened to multiple normal folks podcast signed up for back on my feet running in Atlanta which apparently is a Back on My Feet chapter in Atlanta, and watched Undefeated. Amazing stuff. Thanks. Thanks for putting all this great content together. Michael Lignas. So you found us in GodBust. I did. Yeah. And you just started listening. That's right.

And you're a runner. I am. And so we say all the time, when passion and discipline meet opportunity, amazing things happen in people's lives. And that sounds like exactly what happened with you. It did. It did. The first podcast I went to was Ann Malhams. Ann Malhams.

Yeah. I mean, I think God kind of pointed me to that one first because he knew that would resonate with me the most out the bat. So to recap, Ann Malam started back on my feet kind of accidentally. She was struggling with bulimia and other stuff in her life and her cheap therapy was running. She's a runner. She grew up an athlete, very athletic

and she ran past this homeless shelter in Philly numbers of times and noticed the guy sitting on the porch and she would stop at run in place at the stop sign or stoplight then move on and one day one of them screamed down after seeing her three or four weeks running, and hey, is all you do all the time is run around here and she hollered back and if you knew Anne, is run around here. And she hollered back. And if you knew Anne, this is absolutely typecasting.

She hollered back, hey, is all you do is sit on your, my porch all day. And then she ran off. And on the rest of her run, all she did was think about that. And her father had struggles in his life. And all she could think of is that could be my dad on that porch the next day.

She goes by and says, Hey, I want to start a running club for the homeless guys up here in the shelter. And guy looked at her and said, honey, homeless people don't run unless they're running from the cops. And she said, give me a shot. And that first time she started with six, seven, eight guys. And now back on my feed is in Alex. How many chapters do you remember?

15 chapters and they've helped 7,500. Give me the camera. All right, 7,500. How many, what do they got? They've helped 7,500 former homeless folks. Yeah, 7,500. So an amazing story. That was the one you listened to.

It was. Okay, so what'd you do? So I was like, oh, a running club. And, you know, Atlanta is known as Running City USA. Oh, they are? Yeah. It has the biggest 10K in the world, Peachtree Road Race every day. Really?

Yeah. 65,000 runners at peak since COVID, it's kind of gone down. And so I was like, they got to have a chapter here. So I went on the website, looked up and sure enough, Atlanta chapter, signed up as a volunteer. You go through an orientation because they want you to understand, you know, how to converse with these individuals coming from obviously very challenging lifestyle. And then I started, you know, signing up for the runs. And I go out there usually every Friday morning, you know, at 5 45 for salvation army is the one team.

Sally is the one I'm with and we, you know, run for three or four miles and you just get to know the members and you get to know all, most of the volunteers have been there for 10, 12, 13 years. And then we do runs on the weekend and they have a big fundraiser coming up in three weeks called Meaningful Miles. It's a 5k in Atlanta. It's just been a great outlet to meet more people and get more runs in. It's always a lot easier to run with others than it is to run by yourself. So what was the first... We know the story of Back on My Feet, but the interpersonal part, what was it the first time you showed up to run with a homeless dude? Let's be honest, most of us cross over the street to avoid the homeless dude. Sure.

You're going to hang out and interact and run. What was that like and what did you expect that you found to be quite unexpected? did you expect that you found to be quite unexpected? So yeah, I showed up and I think the gentleman's name was Paul. Paul was the homeless guy you were running with? Paul was the homeless guy, yeah, from Salvation Army. He was actually graduating out of the program and he had a job at a hotel. Which is great. Which is great.

And so, we're running along and they say don't inquire very much, just let let if people are open to talking, they will reach out, but don't push it. Right. So we're just running along and we're just talking about things. And all of a sudden, he's like, hey, I want to pull up and show you my apartment. And he was like, this is the bedroom. And, you know, he's just like showing me everything in there. And he's like, so proud of it. And, you know, for me, it was like, oh my gosh, like what this guy's been through. And now he's like making his way. And he's like, oh, I think I got to interview with the Ritz-Carlton coming up. And if I get that job, I'm probably going to get a chance to go overseas and work

as a cook overseas and just amazing to see how much this person had been through. And they're really making their way and the excitement and Everything it was just it was very humbling did Did any of this happen without back on my feet for him? It wouldn't have happened without back on my feet because I think what back on my feet provides is kind of that Discipline of you know making a commitment getting up in the morning running finding mentors and peers and people just to talk to and those types of things.

So I think that kind of gets them into that regimen of doing things over and over again, which then translates into work and kind of building your life back. So how did it make you feel? Made me feel great. I mean, that's why I was like, at first I was like, oh my gosh, I got to get up at 515 and drive downtown and go run and stuff like that. But now I get home by seven o'clock and I'm like, oh my gosh, the day hasn't even started yet and I've had this fantastic experience.

And then over time, you just see the same people over and over again and you just build relationships. And now when I run with them on, if there's a Saturday open run and I run with them and they're asking me about Sherry and they're asking me about my son and- You mean like normal people. Yeah, exactly. Just like regular normal people. You never know that at the end of the run, they're going to run another mile and go back to a shelter and stay there, but you would never know it when you're running with them and everything.

So how is it when you run with somebody like that, that is asking about Sherry and your family and your life and all of that, and you go back to your home and you know they're going back to a shelter? That's such a dichotomy. If they're able to run and have those conversations and act like normal folks, but then they're going back to live in a shelter, which is not what human beings should be doing. Do you struggle with what in the world got you to the shelter in the first place? And do you also just as your heart say, what can I do to get you out of here?

How does that work? So I would say literally before listening to the podcast and understanding the message on Back on My Feet, I think I would have come in with a stigma of like, gosh, you probably made a lot of bad choices and you're here. But now it's more like, I don't really care how you got here. I'm concerned with the fact that you're making the effort to move up. And I know in a lot of the shows, people talk about consistency. You know, you talk about turkeys and things like that. And the organization, Back on My Feet, just doesn't have the running program,

but they work with these shelters and align people with different programs to because the shelter is really just providing a roof over their head for a period of time. And so Back on My Feet kind of says, hey, here's these programs that you can get in for job training. And, you know, Heather Turton, the director down there says I can get anybody a job if they want a job and they can, you know, be disciplined and show up and that kind of thing. So it's just really about the consistent, you know, in a lot of your podcasts, people

talk about consistency. It's that consistency of them seeing the same person come back and you just, you know, there may be runs where you don't say anything except hello and hey, keep going and all that kind of stuff. But eventually, if you offer up a little information, then they start to open up and offer a little bit of information and then that's how the relationship grows. The fact that they're coming out every week, you know that they're making progress to their goals. That's crazy that you can run with the homeless.

I'm sending this episode to Ann and if she just will listen the first 15 minutes, you know, what an amazing thing that has happened for people all over country from this cute 28 year old girl trying to figure out her life that just decided, hey, I like to run, there's opportunity. I think if they learn this discipline, we can help some people. And now it's trickled down to you. Right. And other people around.

And what an amazing, what an amazing legacy. Absolutely. And again, it's just like you said, I mean, it just like ties in running, which I'm so passionate about. And I obviously wanna see people get back on their feet and get into society and things like that. And to be a part of that is just really special.

And now a few messages from our generous sponsors, but first, the Army currently has 34 premium members including Michael Lignas and we're hoping to grow to 100. And I'm asking you please consider becoming one. By becoming one for 10 bucks a month or $1,000 a year, you can get access to cool benefits like bonus episodes, a yearly group call and even a one-on-one call with me. You should be so lucky. But frankly guys, Premium Memberships help us to grow this army that I believe our country desperately needs right now.

So I hope you'll think about it. We'll be right now. So I hope you'll think about it. We'll be right back. All right, so let's back up. Where does Michael come from? Tell me about Michael. So I'm from Mobile, Alabama. Have a sister, older sister. My dad was a chemist, worked in a chemical plant in McIntosh, Alabama, which is about an hour away from Mobile. Pretty normal childhood, for one exception. My father worked for a Swiss chemical company.

And so when I was four and five years old, we actually got transferred to Switzerland. So I went to first and second grade in Switzerland and learned how to read and write German before I knew how to read and write English. Really? Yeah. So that was a really cool experience. It was great because my mom literally like my dad worked and then my mom just planned our trips on the weekend. So we traveled every weekend we were there for like a year and a half. And so that was a very unique experience.

Yeah, it's got to be kind of cool though. Yeah. Yeah. Because there weren't any American schools where we lived. So we just went to a Swiss speaking school and the teacher knew English. When did you move back to the States? So I moved back to the States when I was like six or seven. I just go to school, go to high school, was a multi-sport player, but went to a division 7A school, so a big inner city school in Mobile and figured a 5'3", 115 pound guy wasn't going to be able to play football. I played football for three days. Our class ended up winning the state championship

my senior year and they had 11 D1 players on them. So they were like big and I was small. So I turned to soccer, which my football coach told me as I quit that I wasn't going to do anything and that I was playing a communist sport. Yeah. What year was this? This was 1980.

Yeah. In the southeast of the 80s, football and soccer had this really odd competition between good old fashioned American sport and the communist sport. It really, southern football coaches would say that soccer was a communist game, which is hilarious because it's a European and South American game. But anyway, so you went and played a communist sport. I went and played a communist sport. You're a damn commie. So you went and played a communist sport? I went and played a communist sport and then decided to go to Millsaps College in Jack

Mississippi. Sure, great school. I played soccer there. In fact, when we were driving here, we passed the Christian Brothers exit and we used to play Christian Brothers every year in soccer. Christian Brothers back in the day was pretty good. They were. They were a good side.

Did that, followed my dad, got a chemistry degree, went home for a couple of years and worked at Seba Gaia with my dad. Realized that the chemical industry was not where I wanted to stay, so I went and got my MBA. By the way, I skipped a really big part. While I was back in Mobile, that's when I met my lovely wife. She was going to physical therapy school at South Alabama in Mobile and that's where we met.

My wife went to UNA, North Alabama. Yeah. So same area. Yeah. Got it. Yeah. That's right. And then, so went and got my MBA at Georgia. So I'm a big Bulldogs fan. And then that's when I got into consulting and I went and worked for one of the, you know, Anderson Consulting, which is one of the biggest consulting companies in the world. And, you know, since then, I've just been in that world and we've had, as you call it, a pretty unremarkable life. I mean, we did have another great event when we adopted our son. We traveled a lot.

I worked over in Germany for a while and so we got to live over. Did you pick your German back up? I did. Literally within like three weeks, was fluent again. I was like running all my meetings in German and everything like that. It was amazing that it all came back you know so fast. It sounds like a beautiful life. Yeah, no it's been great. Do you know the tunnel in Mobile? Yeah, my name is William Bankhead Courtney. Really? Oh, that impressed Sherry. That's right.

That is, believe it or not, my great great, Mutulullah Bankhead was my three great aunt. I know. Yeah. So anybody listening, you can look up the whole Bankhead story. It's not something I'm particularly overly proud of or anything, but it is the truth. Yeah. What's that?

The tunnel is your name. The tunnel is my family's name that somebody gave me one day. So I didn't have anything to do with it, but yes, that's right. All right, so cool. Great life. You get that your, you know, Your parents are obviously, I would say, above middle class if they're

working overseas and everything, but you're not filthy, stinking rich. You don't whatever. You go to Millsaps and you play a communist sport and then you decide to get your MBA from Georgia, who I think this year has an adequate football team. I think they're gonna be all right. They're gonna be okay. You do know you guys are coming to Oxford to play Ole Miss. I know, I know. Gosh, y'all thumped us last year,

and I'm praying to goodness we can have a little better show and at least hold our heads up against you guys. Kirby Smart's a hell of a football coach. Yeah, he is. Okay, so anyway, I digress. So there we are. And I read that your dad gave you some advice when you were in college about being philanthropic.

What'd he say? Well, I think he just said, you gotta keep that in mind, right? So, one of the things at Siba, Gagi, when I joined, one of the things you could automatically get taken out of your paycheck was the United Way. They'd always take out whatever, $5, $10. And he was like, yes, you have to do this. I mean, I was making nothing and I'm like, wait, five or $10, that's a couple of beers on a Friday night or something like that. He's like, no, you have to do that. And that kind of started it. And then when I graduated from Millsaps and came home, he just said, you got to kind of

pick out a charity you want to give to also. And I still to this day do not recollect how the connection was made, but St. Jude was the one that I picked. And so I've been, since 1988, I've been given to St. Jude and like how I got there, I have no idea. But that's where that connection started. Well, then it feels like you were raised to at least give. Would you agree with that? I would, I mean it's always been kind of part of my DNA.

Okay, so you read Guidepost. Between that period of your life and when you read Guidepost, had you been involved in philanthropic stuff consistently? What else have you done? So, a lot of stuff with my church. So we were Greek. We go to the cathedral in Atlanta, which is a pretty large Greek Orthodox church.

And we have a festival, Greek festival every year, four-day event. Time out. Sherri, you're not Greek. Originally. How do you do? Yeah. You just don't look Greek to me. So you got adopted into the Greekness?

Yes, I did get adopted into the Greekness. Yeah? It was part of the, you asked about what happened the 13 years. 13 years? Part of the challenge was there was some resistance of me not marrying a Greek girl. Oh really? Yes. My grandmother called her Xanthia, which in Greek is the blonde, for five years. She wouldn't even say her name. No. And then for four more years she called her

Sandy. Oh my goodness. Sherry, you put up with a bunch of mess, didn't you? I did. My goodness. I don't have to admit, but I did. Yeah, she did. Did you ever see My Big Fat Greek Wedding? The what?

Did you ever see My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the movie? Yeah, yeah. It's reversed. There it is. It's out of the girl, but yes, I mean, it is like right on the whole thing. Yeah. All right. So now we reestablish you come from a communist racist Greek family. Yes. So yes. So you Greek church and you... I've like chaired the festival. You know what I mean? We're talking... We have a Greek Orthodox in Memphis and they have

a big Greek festival every year. Everybody does. Yeah. Well, the food will make you consider Greek orthodoxy for sure. It is phenomenal. Yes. Yeah. So did a lot of that with the, and a lot of other things kind of with the church. You know, really to get to the guidepost thing, I was with my former company for 16 years. We had turned it around, built it up, and then sold it to a much, much, much larger company. And I went through a kind of dark period because I watched everything that we had built in the

company kind of dissolve, all the values and things like that kind of dissolve. And it was tough. You mean the culture of the new company came in and superseded the culture you built. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Why was that dark? and just kind of- Superceded the culture you built. Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. Why was that dark?

Because it was very hard for me to watch that go away because I knew all the work we had done to build it up over the years. And so- But you got a big check. I got a check. I wouldn't say it was a big check. Okay, you got a check.

I got a check, but it was just so hard and I was watching people leave and long time employees leave and things like that. And Sherry, I'll tell you, I mean, I was not very fun to be around and things like that. And so I knew I needed to leave, but I stuck around because there was another check out there. And finally, I came home from, we came home from Thanksgiving last year and got on the phone with my boss and he's like, hey man, I hate to tell you but your position is eliminated

and you're out in four weeks. And there was a little bit of shock and awe. I went and said, okay, I got to go upstairs and talk to Sherry and a little bit of shock and awe. I went and said, okay, I gotta go upstairs and talk to Sherry and a little bit of shock and awe. And then Sherry said it was like the first time and a long time that I slept through the night. And at that point I knew that it was the right thing. And I think really God had been telling me

for a couple of years, like you need to get out. This is really bad. And since you went and listened, he put you out. Exactly. He just said, we're done. We're out. And so I asked Sherry if I could take the all of 2024 off and like figure out what I'm going to do next. There were words said that I can't say on the podcast saying no, at the end of it was no, you get a quarter off. So I got the first quarter off. And then I think the guidepost came like in January of that year.

Now that is interesting time. Yes. And then I had all this free time. So this was my chance to really go after some philanthropic things because I'd said- Are you telling me the blonde would not give you a year off? She would not give me a year off. She would not give me a year off. She would not give me a year off. Yeah, nobody needs to give me a year off.

She did that. Yeah, she did. She was like, you're going to go crazy. Along with running a lot, playing a lot of golf, I started getting into a lot of charitable things and obviously Armie and Normal folks like opened up a whole bunch of you know things for me to do while I had that time and now that gave me some time to establish some things and now it's just part of my routine right so see that's the greatest thing that you say an army of normal folks

one of the other things we always say I I think they're called riffs, I don't know, they're production, Alex productions speak terms or word, but one of the things I say a lot is, if you listen to Army of Normal Folks long enough, that every episode should be entertaining, hopefully make you laugh, but it's always not always not gonna, they're not all gonna align with what you're passionate about in this one is. But if you listen long enough, you're going to hear something that aligns with something that you're good at and that you're passionate about.

And I don't think finding areas of need is very difficult. So that's how you bring those three things together to create opportunity for yourself to serve and thus to lead. But you got to listen long enough to find them. And to hear you say, you know, I had some time on my hands and I listened to Army Normal Folks and obviously there were a lot of things that came along that interested me. You are absolutely verifying our little experiment called an army of normal folks. That's great

It is great. Yeah, and it's why you're inspiring to me because that's what we're trying to do We'll be right back All right, so you're in this weird place. You've done everything right your whole life except for the communist sports. And you built help build a company, and then you find yourself with nothing to do. And you're filling the time with just I'm going gonna take a quarter off, kind of re-energize my batteries and I'll figure it out from here, which I assume you have. Yes. Congratulations. Good. Yep. But in the meantime, you start to run it back on my feet. And of course, I guess you were still giving to St. Jude as you've always done. Right. Right. So here are some interesting emails.

Ran with back on my feet this morning and reached out to the local Sleep in Heavenly Peace to volunteer there. It's so inspiring. Tell me about that. Well, I just, you know, again, I was looking for other ways to get involved. When I heard Mr. Michelson's podcast, I was like, well, let me see if there's a local chapter around here. I reached out to them.

I haven't really been able to do a lot with them. But then later on, I listened to the Care Portal podcast and signed up for that service. So we try to, like every month, try to fulfill one of those requests. And there's a number of those requests that ask for beds. And so that's where I was like, hey, I wonder if we can get those two together because I'm seeing these Care Portal requests for beds and obviously, sleep and heavily peace makes beds. So maybe they can work together and you know, get some beds to fulfill some of these care portal requests. And?

And I think, I think Alex said he's been trying to put them together. Yeah, so representatives from both nonprofits want to talk and I need to connect them. So it's all set up. And we didn't do that. You, my friend, did. By listening to podcasts and seeing the synergies and making the connection. That is so cool. I don't know really what else to say about that, except that's just amazing. How does that make you feel? Makes me feel great. I mean, because obviously it's one organization's goal to make these beds, and it's another one that needs it. So why not put them together and fulfill those needs and

make it happen? Because they're both in the, like I think I called the Gwinnett County sleep and heavenly peace. And I see from Care Portal, most of the requests are coming through Gwinnett County. So they should be pretty closely located together. You said this on April 12th. So as you talk about incorporating God into the things that bring you joy, I went on a run at 545 this morning with a group out of downtown out of downtown Atlanta it's called back on my feet it's a running program for getting people out of out of homelessness wow so again it's to incorporate

discipline and some fitness and those type of things this morning when we were running i was talking to a five-year veteran who unfortunately had some tough things happen in his life and put him in the situation. He's really working to try to pull his way out of it. So again, I'm running right, which hits my fitness priority. There's a faith component. I'm building some friendships because I, you know, see this person every week when I go out there and run and so it's it's not a big deal because I can wake up and run. It's not a big deal because I can wake up and go. I'm about to do something that hits multiple priorities. How great is that? Then just another example, two weeks ago, I'm a member of a Greek church in Atlanta. We had a weekend drive where people would come and buy

food and pastries. I was in the kitchen cooking, I made 500 gallons of, I don't know what this word is, tzatziki sauce, I guess. Some kind of Greek sauce. I'm sure it's fabulous over the weekend. And again, I'm working in my church and I'm cooking. It was my recipe. And of course, everybody was telling me I was missing this and missing that

and all kinds of stuff like Greeks always do. but it's another way that I'm doing something that I like so much and it's hitting so many things that I value the most so why would I not spend the whole weekend making gallons of sauce we often talk about you don't have to be part of some big 501 c3 you don't have to be asked you don't have to be asked. You don't have to be tabbed. You can serve and be a part of an army of normal folks in so many different ways if you just employ your passion and your abilities where need fits. And just in that little part of an interview you did, you're talking about making Greek sauce and running with one homeless dude, but it makes a difference. What does it do for you?

Well, it's such a natural fit, right? Because I love to cook and I love to run, and this way I can do both of those things, be philanthropic, meet some great new people, learn a recipe that every Greek that comes by and puts a spoon in it and tells me I'm missing lemon, garlic, salt, pepper, too much cucumber, all that kind of stuff. And so I get to interact with a lot of different people. And so it's such a great mesh

of just like all these great things. Now, really, when I evaluate what I'm going to do, I look at things differently and say, if this checks off seven things that are a priority for me, why wouldn't I do them? Go do that. Go get up in the morning at 5.15 and go run because you're going to get so much out of the experience. Who cares if you, you know, you're a little bit tired at work and stuff like that. April 15th, gents, that's to me and Alex. Another great podcast this week with Enrique at St. Jude. When I got my first job out of college, I picked one organization and started giving

to him St. Jude's. We talked about that. I picked one organization, started giving to him, St. Jude's, we talked about that. I have given since 1998. I will sign up for the monthly deal at Army and Normal Folks. I plan to go to their fundraising event next year and hopefully get into a place. P.S., I reached out to Big Al about tornado relief.

Great guy. How did your chat with Big Al go? Big Al is awesome. Tell us Big Al's story. Yeah, so Big Al has a kind of a organization for disaster relief, mainly tornadoes and hurricanes. And he's got a buddy of his that has a pull behind smoker that he brings with him that Al kind of runs

around and finds what people need and usually has like an affiliation with a local home supply store. So he's running around getting gloves and all kinds of things for those people. Meanwhile, his buddy's like cooking barbecue and stuff so they can feed the volunteers, feed the people that are out there. And again, I'm like, okay, well, I've actually want to maybe in a couple of years get a smoker. Cause again, I love cooking and stuff like that.

And I was like, wow, this is a great idea. What this Greek sauce would take like on some, on her shoulder. It would be good. Yeah. It would be good. Put some big out barbecue and some Greek sauce together. Exactly. See what happens. Yeah. Some disaster relief. be good. Put some big-out barbecue and some Greek sauce together, see what happens. Yeah.

Some disaster relief. So I reached out to him and I swear, I think he emailed me back the next day. So we had it back and forth and I just said, hey, if something happens down my way, just give me a call and we'll hook up. Fortunately, it hasn't happened. Most of the storms have been kind of in the Midwest and up where he is. But again, just to see somebody respond so quickly and like say, oh, and I'll get you, my buddy and he'll set you up with his recipe so you can check that out and things like that. I mean, it's just, I would have never connected with anybody like that before. And so it's just I would have never connected with anybody like that before. And so it's just a great experience to know that there's people out there doing those

types of things that align with what you want to do. And like you say, many times, a lot of people just don't know where to start and how to get involved and things like that. And it's just making a connection like that and seeing, hey, somebody else is actually doing it. Let me tag on with them and have the same type of experiences. Gents, June 2nd. Gents, another amazing story. I'm getting requests through Poor Corp, but through Care Portal and a lot of them ask for beds. I wondered if Care Portal knew Sleep and Heavenly Peace people. I'm working on making that connection beds. I wondered if Care Portal knew Sleep in Heavenly Peace people. I'm working on making that connection happen.

I had another great run with Back on My Feet yesterday. Have a great week, Michael. Tell me what you've done with Care Portal now. So with Care Portal, my gosh. Tell us about Care Portal. Yeah, so Care Portal is phenomenal. I can't remember the gentleman's name that put that together, but-

Alex can. Adrian Lewis. Adrian Lewis, yeah. Yeah, Encyclopedia Brown of names over there. Exactly. So yeah, amazing service where he takes needs from the foster system. Has created almost like a clearinghouse of how to get those out there. And then an alignment of churches that will fulfill the needs. So the nice thing for somebody like me is I see the request, I say, hey, I want to fund this. And then the church actually takes the money, goes and gets

the stuff and actually fulfills it. So it's a very easy way for somebody to get involved and not have to take the time to go find it and get it to the people and all that kind of stuff. We've just decided as a family that we're going to do one of those a month. Are you doing one of those a month now? Yeah. They'll come through and we probably get two or three of them a day and there'll be something that just kind of hits home for one reason or another.

Like the last one we did was back to school. There was a family that had four or five kids that needed supplies for school. So we just said, hey, we'll fund it. And then there was a church that went and picked up all the stuff and got it to the family. Which is awesome. Which is great. But the coolest part about this is you started through Care Portal getting requests for kids that didn't have beds, but you'd also listen to sleep in

heavenly peace and said, hold it. Here's two army and normal folk episodes that one needs one. One has the other put them together. Yeah. And as it worked. I don't think not yet, right? It's still working on it. They both agreed to talk to each other.

Yeah, yeah. So the point is, a listener, not somebody running either of these things that just decided to get involved as they could, saw an opportunity by connectivity through two groups that didn't even know about each other to maybe help serve the community together. That's exactly what we're trying to create. That is the coolest thing in the world. world. Again, how does that happen? How did you make the connection? Well, I think part of it is as a consultant, I'm like a doctor for business. So I come in and I

look for ways, typically it's the same way in a company. You have silos of functionality, finance doesn't talk to sales and sales doesn't talk to manufacturing. My job is to bring them together and hopefully help them to perform at a higher level by either introducing technology or changing process or looking at the organization. So I think I have an instinctive mind to say, hey, I see two things that put together would be better. And so that's just the way I work. Every time I listen to a podcast, my mind is thinking either how do I get involved or how can this help this, et cetera, et cetera. you know, etc. etc. I mean, I was in I was in Starbucks today and yesterday and I

wanted a blueberry muffin and they said they were out but there were blueberry muffins sitting in the Like sitting in the case and he's like, oh, I can't sell you those in my mind was thinking I had just listened to the farm link podcast two days before and I'm like, how can we get these muffins? These muffins have got to be edible, right? They can't be how can we get these muffins? These muffins have got to be edible, right? How can we get these muffins out to the hungry people that need them? I mean, that's just the way my mind works. Yeah, it's your discipline meeting your passion

and seeking opportunity. That's exactly what that is. So I'm really going, gosh, can I go get a U-Haul and start running around to all the... Go get all the two day old muffins that they don't sell that this guy outside would be happy to eat. Yeah.

That is freaking hilarious. And that concludes part one of my conversation with Michael and you don't want to miss part two that's now available to listen to. Together guys, we can change this country. And it starts with you. I'll see you in part two.