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Unleashing Your Inner Midlife Badass (with Craig Sweeney)

“I think there’s so many folks out there that, that think of aging. In midlife as a point whereby which everything is downhill from here. And I certainly haven’t hit my stride yet. And my future is bright and I want to kick some ass for the next 30, 40, 50 years. And I want to take others along on the ride and hear their stories and how they’re doing it.” – Craig Sweeney

What do you think of when you hear the term “badass”? The leather clad rocker on the Harley? Navy SEALs? Mixed Martial Artists? How about the middle-aged person you see in the mirror every morning? Craig Sweeny, founder of Over 50 Badass, challenges us to unleash our inner badass simply by living the best life we can live and being the person we know we can be.

Craig discusses:

  • The high school reunion that was the genesis for Over 50 Badass
  • Getting out of the midlife ruts
  • How to approach changing jobs or careers in midlife
  • Moving past those who don’t want us to change or improve.

Ready to become the badass you were meant to be?

Let’s get started!

 

Next Steps:

Connect with Craig at http://www.Over50Badass.com or on Instagram at @Over50Badass

Also, if you enjoyed this episode, please share with others and leave a review at: LoveThePodcast.com/MidlifeMastery

 


 

Social Links:

Instagram: @MidlifeMasteryPodcast

 

Facebook: @MidlifeMasteryPodcast

 

Other Resources:

Imperfect Action! Podcast My other podcast. Providing ideas, information, and inspiration from entrepreneurs, bestselling writers, experts, fitness champions, and musicians who have ignored common wisdom and charted their own course.

 


 

Episode Transcription

Note: this was transcribed by AI so please excuse any errors or grammatical weirdness in transcription.

 

Broc: [00:00:00] Welcome to Midlife Mastery. This is Broc Edwards. And today I’ve got Craig Sweeney. Craig. Can you do just a quick introduction about yourself? Who are you and what are you up to?

Craig: [00:00:07] Yeah, well, I’ll lead with my age because this is Midlife Mastery. So I’m a gen X-er, 54 years old resided in the beautiful state of Wisconsin.

And I about two years ago now started a niche media company called over 50 badass and started off with an email newsletter. We are actually. I will say rejiggering the whole platform right now and, and coming out with a new community platform that will consist of the newsletter and the upcoming podcast.

Some courseware online courseware and some other, some other neat things virtual and in-person events on down the road are there. But so just looking at life I think, you know, from the perspective of the glass, you know, getting being, you know, not half-full but, but certainly more than half full.

And so I think there’s so many folks out there that, that think of aging. In midlife as a point whereby which everything is downhill from here. And I certainly haven’t hit my stride yet. And my, my future is bright and I want to kick some ass for the next 30, 40, 50 years. And I want to take others along on the ride and hear their stories and how they’re doing it.

And just applaud the people that have that same attitude and maybe, you know, lift some other folks up that, that have gotten you know, gotten a little bit down with their mid-life or, or feel that they need some, a kick in the pants, if you will. And a reminder that. For God’s sakes, we’re all aging you know, we’re in midlife where, where we don’t have a foot in the grave yet folks let’s, let’s still get out there and, and really, really do shit. I mean, I apologize , Broc in advance. I tend to let an S word out here and there or something. So if you need that, you need that to, to bleep me out and you go right ahead.

Broc: [00:01:57] We’re good. Well, I mean, and I mean, it’s over 50 badass . Definitely taking a stand that a lot of media companies platforms wouldn’t. So let me ask, you know, why did you choose the name and beyond the name? What, what was the impetus that made you say, nah, I got to go do this.

Craig: [00:02:18] So, okay. The Genesis over 50 badass and I’ll try, try to keep this as short as possible. I was invited to my 30 high school reunion. This was about three years ago now. So I was 51 at the time. And as one does, when a big reunion is coming up, you tend to make connections on Facebook with platform or classmates that you haven’t heard from, from for quite some time.

And I started in these groups on Facebook hearing about my former classmates and former friends, aches and pains, you know, how they’re, they’re getting out of bed and it’s not as easy as it used to be, you know, complaining about certain things being overweight or. You know, what have you and how they can’t wait to retire take their pension, spend all day fishing, go up to the lake , buy the RV, whatever it may be.

And I turned to my then fiance. Now wife. Yeah. Are you freaking kidding? I said we are 51 years old and I’ve gotten this group of classmates that’s acting as though we’re 80 yeah, and I, you know, I could not believe it. I was actually pretty appalled. I’ve never been one to, I’ve always been pretty healthy.

So I’ve, I’ve been blessed with that. And I know some people aren’t as healthy. So, you know, there are legitimate concerns as we go over and that’s not something that I want you to ignore over 50 badass, but certainly I was the. Perspective of life being on the down slide was completely foreign to me.

And in hearing people that I once was close to and in some instances still am take that viewpoint or have that attitude really hit me hard and being a writer with creative writers, somebody who’s. Developed copy, worked in the advertising space for quite some time. I sit, I’ve got to do something about this.

There’s gotta be a group of people out there that feel the same way IB and I, and I know there were, I mean, there’s people that I hang around there, you know, my wife and I tend to hang around with folks and they’re in their forties primarily. But you know, I couldn’t believe this. And I said, I’m going to go set up to find my tribe, my game.

And if we can help some other folks along the way, Realize that, Hey, things aren’t as gloomy as they may seem as you’re hitting your fifties or 55, 60 years old, whatever it is. I want to do that. So I started writing an email newsletter the, the tone of the newsletter the name over 50 badass quite frankly, was fairly calculated.

I, I really think that as you know, as we were talking earlier, There’s not a lot out there that discusses the, the, the transition into mid-life out of mid-life into your, your senior age category that that’s really My, my opinion valuable, other than certain, you know, things, you know, like we talked about pharmaceutical focused articles articles and, and think tanks, et cetera, that I feel come at the subject, you know, very.

I guess pseudo educational, almost nonprofity type of way, if you will. There’s not a strong brand out there that that really talks to this to this issue, this age group, this demographic you know, I look at AARP and, and I, I kind of, I was talking to somebody early on. And they said you want to be an alternative to AARP.

Right. And so know that’s somewhat it. Right? I think, I think AARP has some fantastic things. I mean, I, I resisted in therapy for a damn long time. I, you know, those, those envelopes would start flying into the mailbox in 45 and that, and they’d go straight to the circular file at home. Just because I was like, hell no, I’m not, I, I’m not getting a senior.

You know, a senior price for coffee and McDonald’s, and I’ll pay full price for the movie. Thank you very much. You know, I’m not old, you know, and I still, to this day, I’m still my meter. Never, although I, my attitude is, is somewhat socking to that, but You know, the whole, the whole tenor, the way I talk to folks is, is not in a preachy you know, way, you know, where I’ve got all the answers I’m talking to my audience.

Like I would talk to somebody sitting next to me at the, at the bar, at the pub over a glass of beer. The people that I want to help with over 50 badass. In general, and I’m going to put air quotes around that aren’t in general, the folks that have a life coach the folks that may seek out other, you know, literature, other articles they might not have an, a career culture and probably I’d say probably don’t have a career, a life coach.

These are folks that maybe have been working on, I’m gonna use a Milwaukee reference cause I’m sitting there. I’m working on the line at, let’s say Harley Davidson for 30 years and wake up one day and they say, holy shit, I am unhappy. I don’t like what I’m doing. I need to make a change, you know, just from, from, from a psychological perspective or I need to make a change from a financial perspective because they’re not, you know, I’m not, I’m certainly not ready financially to retire.

And so there’s, there’s reasons people are in midlife. Either have to, or want to make a big change. And a lot of us are, are completely paralyzed when we think about making those big either career or life changes. Right. And I think there needs to be resources that talk to people in a real way and, and, and really kind of help them take that first step, if that makes sense.

And that’s what I’m setting out to do here. at over 50badass.

Broc: [00:08:17] Yeah. You know, it seems like so much of the advice, the information out there is getting back to zero. You know, like taking something that’s broken and just making it good enough. It’s not, how do you do this? Great. How do you keep accelerating?

How do you make this, the absolute best time of your life? The, you know, the rest of it seems to be about just getting through, you know, gutting it out till you retire until you die, whatever. It it’s, it’s not about so much of it. Isn’t about, you know, ramping up, bringing out your inner badass as you were talking about.

Why is that? I mean, I know we, we go through life, we get in ruts, we develop bad habits, whatever, but now, you know, we kind of hit this point where we do wake up and go, I’d like something, a little different, you know, I, I don’t see myself doing this for another 20, 30 years. Where do we tend to get in our own way?

Craig: [00:09:08] No, I think what you said, you know, kind of, kind of hits the nail on the head. You know, we get these ruts and I think it’s a combination of, of our own our own reticence to change. And some of that’s been attributed to just sheer laziness. You know, the fact that we’re, we’re, you know, we’re kind of in our stride, in our twenties, thirties, and forties, you know, our, our job is.

Well, we look at our job is good. It’s paying the bills where we’re putting money into our 401k, but normally you’ve got the kids and the spouse lock, you know, if you’re lucky that. You know, kind of distract you maybe from your unhappiness at times, from your, you know, from your I guess average illness.

And I think we wake up when some of those outside distractions are, are possibly gone. Your kids are, your kids are grown, maybe they’re off university, or they moved out and got a place of their own. And we have more time with ourselves. And quite frankly, you know, when we do have more time with ourselves, then that’s when you know those big.

No this big batches come in and you like, you wake up, then you’re like, holy crap. I gotta, I gotta do something. You know, I’ve got, you know, 40 years left and, and you know, kill myself with my, up to go to this job one more day. Yeah, the problem with that is, you know, most of us haven’t been, you know, that has made changes quite wow.

And they ability, or even they know how to, to take those steps, isn’t there, or, or, you know, has been long forgotten. And on, in addition to that, you’ve got, you’ve got the cultural The cultural pressures of either your friend group or your work group, your church group, your family saying, you know, what the hell are you doing?

You’ve got, you’ve got this great job. You know, you guys have a great house, you know, you’re fine. What are you, what are you complaining about? You know? And so they’re looking at you, like, you know, You’re crazy to want to make a change. And a lot of times those, those forces and they mean, well, most of the time some of the time they don’t but they mean, well, most of the time, but they, they are keeping a lot of us from making those changes that we need or want to make.

Broc: [00:11:34] Yeah. You know, it, it occurs to me that, and I just, you know, think you have random stuff, you know, the line from the song, me and Bobby McGee by Janis Joplin of, freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose. And you know, when you’re, when I was in my twenties, like I had no money, I could switch jobs.

I mean, there was nothing to lose and it was all upside and yeah, I can see. Looking around at my peers. You know, you hit the 50 you’re, you’re probably comfortable. You’ll probably have a mortgage car payments, college payments, whatever hopefully a pretty decent paying job, you know, hopefully you’re, you’re kind of on the high end, you’ve been working your way up the pay scale and.

You know, that’s hard to put at risk. It seems like we, at this age, we often just change when life kicks us in the head, you know, we, we get divorced, we lose our job, we get downsized, whatever. I don’t know. I guess I’m wondering how do we, how do we initiate that change before the world forces us to change?

Craig: [00:12:32] Yeah. And so it’s an interesting question. I think you know, when I looked at the word badass and I. People, I get confused by, you know, oh, you know, I don’t want to be a badass no, I don’t want to, I don’t want to buy it early. I don’t want to, you know, dress in black and, you know, go to rock shows every weekend.

That’s not what this is, you know? So, so making a change could be as simple as reconnecting with your badass if you will. So for instance, I used to, I used to race. I used to be a skier. I’ve, I’ve not skied for a few years now. That was something that I felt bad after doing, you know whatever that gets, you know, identify your badass.

We identify those things that really, you are passionate about what you’re younger. You don’t have to make sweeping changes with your life. There’s plenty of us that I call badass ones that are completely happy. With their current job with their spouse and what have you, but there’s something missing you know, maybe they have lost that passion.

Right. So, you know, my suggestion is what did you used to do when you were younger than that? You just got, you just got so much joy out of it, or you kicked ass at that you haven’t done for awhile. Let’s just go and dust that off, pick it up. And, you know, maybe you young, you’re probably not going to, you know, probably not going to do it as well.

And you might pull a muscle now, but you know, do this, reconnect with  your badass self so I apologize. But if that makes sense you know, the changes don’t always have to be a huge sweeping changes, so  within that, you know, Going for the small changes or reconnecting with the things that they used to bring joy, the things that we used to really care about.

Broc: [00:14:16] One of the things you mentioned is that sometimes people with the best of intentions will kind of if not, if not discouraged, at least not actively encourage

Craig: [00:14:37] yeah. And I think a lot of, a lot of us have people in our lives that do discourage. And I think there’s, there’s certainly multiple reasons. And, and, you know, some of them are, are good reasons, but a lot of them are their own fear that, that you’re going to outgrow them. Oh.

That, you know, maybe they’ve got the fear of making change. They’ve got the fear. Of, of really stepping out into your, into your midlife in a confident way. And they’re, they’re, they fear that they’re going to get left behind, so they discourage you. And so I think there’s a lot of that going on and, you know, they’re, they’re wanting to maintain the status quo that, you know, Hey, this person’s going to make changes, grow, and they’ll, you know, really.

Roll out of our friendship or our relationship. And I think that there’s, there’s, there’s an issue there. And then, you know, there’s the old saying, you know, you are the sum of the people that the five people that you hang around with and, you know, there is some of that. So I think you need to. You need to look at your tribe.

And if they’re discouraging you from, from setting goals at midlife or making changes in a positive way, I mean, suddenly there’s positive and negative changes, but if you’re, if you’re looking to make positive changes and you’re getting discouraged and you have to look at, you know, Hey, you know, maybe that’s somebody that I shouldn’t be associating with quite as, quite as frequently or quite as deeply.

So yeah, you’re exactly right.

Broc: [00:16:08] Well, you know, kind of redefining rediscovering ourself. Like I said, you know, sometimes the world foisted on us, sometimes it doesn’t sometimes we, we get to make those choices in, in the calm of things. You know, one of the things that a lot of people, I think our age face is career.

It’s easy to be comfortable in a career. It’s easy to kind of get to the box canyon of your career. You know, you’ve made it so far and you know, you’re probably not going to make it a lot further where, where you are either from your own comfort or just that that’s about as far as you’re going at that company.

So, I don’t know how this, how am I far, this goes into your area of expertise, but what advice do you have or what have you seen for people that are, you know, wanting to change careers at this time alive and whether they’re comfortable or they’ve just been kicked out of their job or whatever it is, you know?

For a lot of people they’ve probably been in that job for a while. And aren’t up on job hunting or where they should even look or how to present themselves in the world’s going. Yeah. We’d like someone younger kind of a rambling question, but you know, when we think about redefining careers, a part of that, where, where to start.

Craig: [00:17:12] Yeah, I, that is a, it’s a, it’s a complicated question, but really. You are spot on when you, when you talk about, you know, many of us have not been on the job search for many, many years, and it’s, it’s different when we hit this midlife stage. Ageism is a real thing. You know, despite the data that shows that our intergenerational workforce is much more productive than a strictly younger workforce I’ve seen ageism in practice being an advertising space.

For many, many years. I was senior vice president for an agency about 10 years ago. And you know, in my early forties I felt ancient in that space. So, you know, there are, there are certain industries where it’s more prevalent than others, but certainly across the board, age-ism is a prevalent issue in this country and indeed all around the world.

Actually, we, we recently took on an investment from a European investor to to look into this further and to bring to market.  job and resource platform for folks in this, that we’ll address this exact issue. So that’s something we’re really looking at right now. It’s it’s you need to, you need to market yourself differently as you enter middle age you need to market your, your skills and your experience, not in a linear fashion like you did when you were younger.

You need to not speak to, you know, Hey, 35 years in this role at this company so blatantly you believe, you know, you believe that that’s a feather in your cap and you do believe in that. I’m not saying it’s not true, but you believe that that is something that is looked on favorably, but corporate America will look at that and look at it differently in that, you know, this person.

Like it or not as older and that, that ear outrider lady age-ism can, can creep in. So, you know, you need to not, not hide your, your age if you will, but certainly learn how to message your experience and skillset in a different way than you did when you were 35 years old. If that makes sense.

Broc: [00:19:30] Yeah, and I know everyone’s situation is different, but what are some of the, the general advantages of, you know, those of us who are over 50 bring to the workplace?

Craig: [00:19:43] Yeah. So I, I think, I think the workplace is changing. I think, you know, COVID has certainly changed the workplace tremendously. I think the age, whether or not you’re 30, 40, 50, or 60, the age of. Going into the office working nine to five. And in many instances, collecting the paycheck with you know, with a good insurance package can, can be a thing of the past.

And you know, we’re not going to go back to where we work three COVID. I think the opportunities that exist, or somebody at midlife or older to take their experiences. And their skills that they’ve developed over the course of 30, 40 years, and really partly that into a fantastic second half in terms of the ability to either freelance, the ability to.

No, I got that franchise, maybe that you’ve been eyeing up for 25 years, but never had the guts to make that change and do that, the ability to do remote work. That’s something that I see it as I look to midlife and beyond you know, certainly Broc yourself, myself. We can do this from anywhere.

And those types of, of career changes. Are are something that we as a group in midlife need to embrace. Not everybody can make those changes. I understand that some people have to go in and get that traditional nine to five job. But there are opportunities out there that are she had them now, whereas, you know, even 10 years ago and certainly, you know, pre COVID To to say, Hey, I’m going to quit this nine to five, or, you know, I was downsized for whatever reason, perhaps possibly ageism.

And I’m going to, you know, open up my own shop you know, you know, hang out my own shingle The attitude of about that has changed. And I think COVID has done a great job in changing that attitude. I think it’s given, it’s given a lot of us, the ability, the freedom to make the change. If that’s, you know, if something good has come out of these past.

15 months or so I think that’s it. I think it’s giving you, it’s given some of us the freedom, some of us forced to make the change. Right. But even us that hadn’t been forced to make a change. It’s given us the freedom and the ability to do that. And, and that, I don’t want to paint too rosy of a picture, obviously, because, you know, certainly this has been difficult, you know from an economic standpoint, from a health standpoint, but there has been some positives that have come out of COVID from a career standpoint, especially with our demographic.

Yeah, and I think that, that those opportunities are only going to increase as we move forward and come out of this this pandemic.

Broc: [00:22:38] It was interesting watching companies go from there’s no way people can work remotely to the very next day. Y’all just pack up your computers and go home now. Okay. And I mean, the change was overnight, even very conservative, big, slow moving industries were just suddenly remote

and it all worked and they just needed something to push the decision. And it certainly does seem to have the potential for opening up a lot of, a lot of opportunities on where you live, what you’re doing, how you’re doing. Is there a way that you’ve noticed? I mean, I know you said you’re working on a job board and a platform to, to really take advantage of it because it strikes me that, you know, living wherever and work, looking for a job wherever.

Well, it was easier in the sense that it was a lot more narrowed when it’s like, I live in this city, I’ll look in this city for a job versus, you know, what’s available on the planet. Like where do you even start?

Craig: [00:23:35] Yeah. And that’s a problem. There, there are a plethora of resources out there to you know, to identify opportunities globally, but you know, to somebody who has taken that, that big giant leap.

And left a career and been forced out in her kind of lost and searching for, for what to do. It’s, it’s really important to, to build a strong network for so long, I think many of us have have confined our network to folks that are in the same industry or the same either the same company or the same role that we have been in for the last 30 years.

And in order to, to really, really excel in our second half. So I think we need to learn how to expand that network. So look at, look at networking with folks that, you know, maybe are not in your role, that, that certainly aren’t just in, you know, working for the same company, they need to start to identify folks in certain other careers that you are interested in.

Start, you know, wanting to meet ups. Really reach out via LinkedIn or Facebook. Nah, there’s a plethora of LinkedIn groups, Facebook groups that you can join, but start networking in those areas that you have an interest in for the next 30 years. So, you know, if you want to get out of, you know, you don’t want to be a CPA any longer.

But you’re interested in designing websites, just as an example, start networking with other folks that are doing that. You know, a lot of times we have this insular network and we need to really broaden that and that, and that means that means geographically as well. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s much easier than, than one might think to develop a strong network of folks outside of your current geography and outside of your current role and in vertical markets.

So if that’s, if I can leave you with one thing, I think that’s most important for you to develop that, that super strong network. You don’t be afraid, you know, add value to the network, but don’t be afraid to strike up conversations. Opportunities present themselves in the strangest way sometimes, but you need to be open to the opportunities.

You need to open yourselves up to discussion and open yourselves up to you know, to really, you know, having a virtual coffee with people and asking them their experience and how they got to where they’re at now. And, and, you know, you’re geographically, if you’re thinking about moving somewhere, there’s there, there are, you know, plate, you know, Places that you can go online that will help you identify people in groups, in those areas that will make that transition much easier for him.

Broc: [00:26:16] So, what are you working on in your own life on becoming more badass at, what do you, what are you trying to tap into?

Craig: [00:26:23] Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s funny. So, so over 50 badass in there and it’s, I’ve kind of identified it over can feedback. As soon as we move forward with this platform, I plan on, on. You know, you know, having more content developers and creators the badass platform so that I’m certainly not the only voice that’s coming out of our organization.

Yeah, I don’t want to hear myself talk constantly and I’m sure everybody else doesn’t either. So I think I want to assemble a collective of that ask is if you will, that each bring to the, you know, to the table, a unique viewpoint, a unique experience and value that they can bring to our audience.

And that’s what we’re going to do. Moving forward. As we, as we bring this new platform to, to to the midlife audience here. So. Pretty excited about, about that. That’s what we’ve been burning the candle on both ends with. And as far as being more badass in my personal life. I got it. I got to get back to them, you know, dust off my skis and get, get, get out there and do some more of those things that I was passionate about when I was younger.

You know, I preach that and I know it in my head, but I, I, I haven’t skied for three years and I need to do that, you know? So, so I’ve got to, I’m going to eat my own dog food, if you will.

Broc: [00:27:43] Well, it, is a nice reminder that , it feels like you just need to be more intentional. Like, I don’t know when I was a kid, there was like three things that I did.

Right. It was easy to do those things. But now as an adult, as a parent, as a husband, you know, I got, I got a job, got interest and. Yeah, just going a million different directions. It’s easy to go. I mean, for me, I love mountain biking and, but it’s easy to go, oh, you know, it’s rainy this weekend, it’s hot this weekend.

I’ve got to clean the garage. You know, got all this other stuff to do and suddenly three months have gone by. Yeah.

Craig: [00:28:12] Yeah, absolutely. Right. You’re absolutely right. And I think, I, I think one thing that I think we could do to, to help us with that would be to identify. No, a group of guys that, that, you know, like the same things that you do, that you can say, Hey, We’re going to, we’re going to set a date and we’re going to do this, you know, every couple of weeks come hell or high water.

And then, you know, razz each other, if you don’t make it because you have to, you know, you have to go to the store or something. So I think I could, I could use a little bit on that, you know, so if you were closer on like moving out. Well, you know, we were talking a little bit earlier before we started re recording.

Broc: And I don’t know if anyone remembers the movie roadside profits. I guarantee I’m probably one of about five people that saw it. It was a great movie, tons of cameos, but w with John Doe from the band X and oh, was it Adam Horvitz from the Beastie boys?  I mean, it had like I’m blanking on like everyone. I mean, everyone from like Timothy Leary had a cameo in it. David Carradine from Kung Fu had a cameo in a John Cusack had a cameo in it. Like everybody kind of on the fringes showed up there.

But anyway, the theme of the movie and getting to the very end, the advice given to, to the John Doe’s character was, you know, get yourself a friend and. That was just, I don’t know. It struck me then I was like in my twenties when I saw it. And now that I’m 50, it strikes me even harder. Just, you know, for a lot of us, our friends are still the people.

Like we went to high school and college where that maybe, you know, that one person at work or whatever, it’s, it’s easy to get to this stage in life where I think a lot of us end up in this stage in life where we don’t have the connections that we had when we were younger, they’re harder to come by or friends, you know, they.

They moved away. There were couples, friends, you know, couples get divorced, you know, just, we kind of bleed friends as we go through life. But that, that connection is so important. And I mean, we were talking a little bit earlier just about, you know, isolation, loneliness that can come from it.

Getting stuck in a ruts, you know, if we don’t have a group of friends to motivate us to come drag us out of the house and go have some fun or, or whatever it is. You know, so from, from your experience and like, how do we solve that problem? And that sounds really weird to, you know, be asking someone in their fifties, like, how do you make a friend?

Craig: But no, that’s a, that’s a great, that’s a great question. You know, in, as we were talking before, this is a big problem, especially, you know, I don’t, I’m not discounting this issue. You know, with our female listeners, but it’s a, it’s a, it’s a big problem with men. A lot of times, you know, you’ve been on this career track and you haven’t forged those deep friendships.

I think it’s easier for women to do that for, for whatever reason it is. Right. I think they’re, they’re, you know, they, they allow themselves to open up more to other women to talk about what might be bothering them emotionally or physically, or what have you. Whereas we’ve always been taught to keep things inside and not.

No, everything’s, everything’s great. How’s it going? Oh, great. Yeah. You know, it’s it it’s, it comes natural that comes out of your mouth, you know? Oh yeah. Kicking ass. Yeah. Everything’s awesome. In reality, you’re, you know, you’re going through something and it’s hard for men to, to open up to other men about that.

And, and that’s a, that’s a question that I, gosh, you know, you and I are going to be able to answer on a podcast, but. The ability to make a connection to make a friend is, is, it’s a tough, tough thing. I, I think it’s, it’s somewhat it’s somewhat, I guess we can too. Dusting off that, that badass Rita that you had about, you know, surfing or mountain biking or skiing or whatever that thing was, you know, punk rock, whatever.

Although I said 55, you know, if I’m wearing a Mohawk, I’m like, he looked at it a little weird, but but no, you can, you can reconnect with some of those, those people that you used to do those badass things with. And they, you know, quite frankly, I’d love to hear from you. You know, it’s just, it’s just then it’s just like, if you’re in a sales job and you don’t want to do a cold call, you don’t pick up the damn phone, you know, send it, send a Facebook message.

I mean, if, if you know, he ain’t, if you feel weird about, you know, picking up the phone, I’ve sent him a Facebook message. Hey man, it’s been, it’s been 20 years, you know, I seek to see your family on Facebook. I see you guys seem like you’re enjoying things, love to get together, you know, you know, and I know that’s not simple, this isn’t Sage advice for anybody, but.

You know, you’d be surprised that that, that other, you know, that other person on the other end of that Facebook is probably, would probably be so psyched to get it from you, you know? And, and I guarantee you, you’re going to make those reconnections if you will. And I think that that’s one way to go about it.

And I think when you, because you do have that shared history you know, from those old friendships, once they’re reconnected, I think the ability to open up to each other at that point is much greater. In many instances than with somebody who is a newer friend, if you will.

Broc: [00:33:29] Yeah, absolutely. Well, this has been fantastic conversation here, Craig.

And so let me ask what, where can people find, find you find the platform what’s, what’s the best way to reach out?

Craig: [00:33:41] Yeah, so you can, you can find me at craig@over50badass.com. Over 50 badass on Twitter, on Instagram. Craig Sweeney on Instagram. Go to the platform at over 50 badass dot com sign up for our newsletter.

We’re going to be coming out with a new platform within six weeks some really fun stuff. And I’ll be leaking that out as we move forward into this, into the summer here, but I’m really, really excited about it. So we’ll be bringing you some fun stuff. And then, you know, I think if anybody can take anything it’s.

You also have to come at this with a dosa of some of our writing and some of our content is going to, you know, it’s, we don’t have to always have to be so serious. We can, you know, take ourselves a little, a little less seriously at times and just go out there and kick some ass.

Broc: [00:34:29] Sounds great. Thank you so much for being on Craig.

Craig: [00:34:31] This has been awesome. Thanks Broc I appreciate you having me, man. I’m going to have to have to have you on mine as well.

Broc: [00:34:37] Excellent. Look forward to it.

 

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