Aug. 2, 2026
Spiritual Sunday: How Curiosity, Kindness And Faith Can Change Your Life With Karl Martin
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RSS Feed We continue our Sunday series, bringing you conversations with faith, leadership and spiritual voices who can offer perspective, inspiration and hope for the week ahead. Today we sit down with leadership coach, author and former pastor Karl Martin, who has spent more than 25 years helping CEOs, athletes, executives and organizations build stronger leaders by focusing on character first. Karl shares why true leadership begins with leading yourself, how curiosity and kindness can transform relationships, and why our greatest challenge today may simply be learning how to be more human.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Welcome everybody to our Spiritual Sunday series. We've got another edition. We're very excited about this. We are hoping that on Sundays you all can tune in get a little inspiration, a little guidance. We've got tough headlines that hit us all week long and certainly we all got personal issues. So it's fun to get some clarity, some vision from folks who are a lot smarter than us. And today we are interviewing Carl Martin. He's a leadership coach, he's a speaker, he's an author, he's a former senior pastor of Central Church in Edinburgh, Scotland. But he's got a consultancy. A consultancy I can't talk. A consultancy group that works with big CEOs, athletes, you name it, and helps them, guides them through leadership mentorship? Is that leadership mentorship? Leadership stuck? Let's get Carl to help me with the words that I cannot bind today. That's what you do for a living. Carl, thank you for being with us. We appreciate you being here.
00:01:07
Speaker 2: It's wonderful to be with you. Guys. I'll help you with your words.
00:01:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, teacher, you could have stepped in and helped me.
00:01:11
Speaker 3: No, no, no, I.
00:01:12
Speaker 2: Like to just smiling while I'm swirling down the marriage advice.
00:01:20
Speaker 3: You know, I just wanted her to see how badly she depends on me in life. I just want her to struggle a little bit.
00:01:25
Speaker 2: There, Carl, Stop digging, Stop digging.
00:01:28
Speaker 3: But Carl, what do you see when you talk to these folks who are in leadership positions? How often our leadership characteristics missing from people who are in leadership positions?
00:01:41
Speaker 2: Yeah? Almost always, TJ. Like we leadership is the greatest of all human skills and abilities, and we don't teach it, and so we assume it, and then we only ever teach it as a catch up exercise when someone gets a job called leader, and then we teach them skills. We don't teach them heartset, soul set, mindset stuff. And so, for instance, if you teach someone profit and loss and you don't teach them honesty and integrity, you create a piece of health for yourself. And we see that all over the place. Leadership crisis not because people don't have the skills, but because they don't have the character to carry the skills. And so that's why you've got political leaders in crisis, business leaders in crisis, church leaders in crisis, family leaders in crisis because no one helped them and they didn't stop to do their work.
00:02:27
Speaker 3: Karl, can I ask on that because people I hear this phrase all the time as you were talking natural born leaders?
00:02:34
Speaker 2: Right?
00:02:35
Speaker 3: Is that a thing? Or is that type of leadership skill and character you're talking about is something that is actually cultivated at some point in your life, whether you were a child or a college.
00:02:43
Speaker 2: Or which just is totally a thing. I mean every if it's true of every single person on this planet. The moment you start to walk, breathe, talk for yourself, you lead yourself, you inspire yourself, you impact other people you lead. So this idea that there are certain people who are leaders and certain people are not leaders, and certain characteristics of leadership. Now there were different kinds of leadership, different capacities of leadership. And the day you stop thinking you have to lead yourself and lead someone else's the day you should give up and go home. So it's a quiet, it's developed, and it's formed. I think the word formation is really important. How do you form your leadership?
00:03:21
Speaker 1: It's intentional, you know, I think everyone listening can agree. It doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on that we are in desperate need for leaders in this country. We've been dealing with a lot of headlines, among them the cyclospora outbreak, and DJ and I have been saying as we've been covering these headlines, we need someone to step forward and be a leader here and give us guidance. And we look for that during the pandemic, we look for that. Now we're in the middle of a war, or can we even call it a war? Why is it so hard to have someone stand up and be that leader we're all looking for? And yes, integrity is a huge part of that. I'm so glad you mentioned that.
00:04:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's because we forgot how to be human. It's because it's because in the moment of a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world, AI wars, tariffs, borders, you know, the whole bangshoot of stuff. The future is going to belong to the people who are most human, the people who know what it means to be a human being, know what it means to build human relationships, know what it means to be honest about this stuff. Wisdom and impact flows out of honesty. And humility and honesty and humility is I'm a broken person and I'm a beautiful and I'm a beautiful person because I'm created in the image of it. I believe a beautiful God, right. And so humility is not thinking less of yourself or thinking of yourself less. Humility is thinking correctly about yourself. So we're living in a world where people don't know who they are, what they're for, how they should show up, and so show up with masks. They pretend they're hiding something, proving something, or afraid to lose something. And therefore you get performative leaders, populist leaders, people who are playing to the crowd rather than doing the right thing. And so it's going to take it's going to take I don't I don't know. I mean, I work with this generation of leaders, and I spend an awful lot of time banging heads against walls and saying that's a piece of nonsense, Stop doing that. I think it's actually going to take us almost skipping a generation and saying let's let's let's teach and train our kids how to be true, brave, kind and curious. Let's teach them how to navigate a world Let's teach them how to be honest and integerous. Let's teach them how to be kind and empathic. Let's teach them how to be bold and make aggressive mistakes, not passive ones. Let's teach them how to be curious. Let's teach him how to Let's teach them how to wonder at the world and continue to wonder all the days of their life, so that they never come to an end of it. And then you're going to create people that you can attach almost every skill set at too, and it will stick and it will make a difference. But we we are so screwed up. And I think how kids are recognizing that? Right? I think how kids go? We don't want to be like you, We want to do the things you did. Let's do something anyway, I'm over talking, but that's what I think.
00:06:16
Speaker 1: It's fascinating.
00:06:18
Speaker 3: Well, you said, we're so screwed up there, Carl, But how do we unscrew it? Seems like we are still going in the direction we shouldn't be for a while. I don't know when and how or where do you see? You said a generation? But where does a course correction potentially even begin?
00:06:36
Speaker 2: Well, I think we're I think in essence that we're super smart people and we're actually really kind people, and I think we've got to stop pretending we're not. And some states we need to have a conversation with ourselves and say, look, we're the project, but we're not the point. Let's address the issues in ourselves. Let's look at our nation, and let's I mean, like, this thing here is killing us, right, I mean, the kids say, are my kids that say I'm sorry phone? Yeah, my kids say, I'm totally obsessed with this thing, right, and it is killing us because it is just polarizing every thought. Right, I don't care what side of the isle you come from, but this just agrees with everything I think and sells me everything I think, to the point where we go further and further and further away from each other, and now we can't have a conversation and we cancel each other, and so we've become incredibly immature. And someone needs to have a conversation about these things. These things are killing us.
00:07:27
Speaker 1: You know.
00:07:27
Speaker 2: I don't care what side of the ale you come from, you know, And I actually think that I actually think that most people are not on the sides of the ales. They're in the middle somewhere and they're going, why have I been forced to think it's either this or this when it's usually not this or this, it's yes, it's yes, an end, and let's have a conversation about these things. So I think we have to have a couple some conversations. I think the work that my clients are doing with me is very brave of them to be honest, that they're having conversations with themselves around stuff that really matters.
00:07:59
Speaker 1: And yeah, no, Carl, I think that is that's the point for everyone listening, for the two of us listening to you that it does. It has to begin with the individual, and you have to look at yourself. You can't be pointing the finger at everyone else. It's easy to say what everyone else is doing wrong. We have to take account and take accountability for what we're doing wrong individually. Do you think a lot of it is that we're all operating out of fear. It's a fear based mentality. Fear we're going to be found out that we're not as smart, we're not as sharp, we're not as talented, and so we posture and we put on these masks because we're afraid, and we're afraid to admit we're afraid totally.
00:08:39
Speaker 2: And so I would just say, let's level the playing field. I talk to people all the time. There are two particular things that come at me. One is imposter syndrome and the other is narcissism. Right, and so there's a bunch of other things, but impostas and Mason right. And the answer that I give them back is, of course, you're an impost Stop trying to pretend you're not. I'm an impost You're an apost or. All impostors, right, Let's put that on the table. If everyone knew everything about my life, we wouldn't be talking right now. If you know every thought I had, every you wouldn't want to talk to me. You won't want to be around my life. Right, So we're an impostor. Get that on the table and recognize that everyone's broken. And now we've got a great conversation about to happen. The imposter scripts are running, We've all got it. I always think, if they find out about my staff, you know, and then on the other side of the equation, the narcissists, all my particularly male clients who are wealthy, successful, they get accused of being narcissists. They're not narcissists. There's about one percent of this world that the clinical narcissists, right, But we're all narcissists. We live in a narcissistic world where where I am at the center of my world and I'm trying to protect myself and you do you and we have to have those conversations because it's killing us. And so I think there, I mean, basically, I think there are three relationships you have to deal with if you're going to correct this thing. Relationship number one, deal with yourself. Have a good conversation with yourself. Who am I really? Why am I that way? Why do I get triggered by the same things, Why do I play the same games, Why do I keep getting the same results? How am I being experienced by people? What does it feel like to be the other side of me? So those kind of conversations are really important. Second conversation, who are my people? Because we have so atomized our relationships that we've stopped doing community. We don't know how to do the wider family thing. We don't know how to have people speaking into our lives. Jim Rowan once said, you're the some of the five people closest to you. I think that's true, and it's also not true enough with some of everyone. We're allowed to speak into our lives, and not enough people are speaking into our lives. We don't know how to build community, We don't know how to have the relationships that we need. We've polarized our relationships to the point where we become echo chambers. So deal with those relationships, and then the final thing that you know. You wouldn't be surprised with me saying I think you have to have a conversation with what you think about God, what you think about something bigger. And you know I have a personal relationship with Jesus and I don't for this instance, I don't care whether you do or not. But if you don't have God, you become God. And that's and you're a crap God. So it's not working for you. There was a preacher years ago, a guy called a w Toza, who used to say, this thing, what you think about when you think about God is the most important thing you ever think. Now, I don't think he was just trying to get your order to become a Christians. I think he was saying what you think about when you think about God frames what you think about yourself. It frames what you think about this world. It frames what you think about your confidence. It brings you security in the storm. It gives you opportunities to build something that's bigger than yourself. So those I mean, I'm preaching that, but those those three relationships really important. You're the project, but you're not the point. Deal with yourself, all issues in yourself. There's no such thing as an individual. There is only community. Whatever Margaret that you're one said, there is only you know, I have clients who are very successful sports men and women. There's no individual sport on the planet. Rory McElroy has a caddy, a shrink pilot, a thing. You know, there's no there's no solo artist, right, there is no solo artist. There are backing singers, there are writers, there are there are these things don't exist. You don't exist except for the relationships around you. You cannot exist properly. And we've we've underestimated this, and we've because we've we've vilified collectivism and socialism and all that stuff has been so bad that we've we've lost community, we've lost a sense of collectiveness and so we have to recover that, and then the god thing is just vital for me.
00:12:44
Speaker 3: And on the point the first thing you started with, you said you have to have a kind of an honest conversation with yourself. And my question is, can you give people some tips on how to make sure that is an honest conversation because oftentimes we find people won't. They're looking to blame, well this happened to me, or I'm like this because my parents did this or whatever else. Can you give folks tips on making sure that first part that you mentioned you're doing correctly and having an honest conversation.
00:13:20
Speaker 2: Obviously totally Well, this will be a much longer podcast. But but but two things that would be helpful starters. One is, you are not your personality profile. You are not your personality profile. You are not your personality profile. That is not the truth. Okay, it's a lens. If it becomes the truth, it becomes a box from which you cannot a scape on which you judge everyone else. So so you know these things are lenses, they're not truth. So understanding that and understanding that it's probably truer that you are the product of the things you have believed, your your your ideologies, the wounds you carry, your injuries, and the influences you have the people around you. That that's probably at a conversation who's been influencing you? What have been saying? What do I believe about life? Where did I get hurt and wounded? And where do I run away from? So that's that's almost a therapy conversation. But that's the thing. The second thing I think is you have to have some trusted people in your life who tell you the truth and and and they you know. So I talk about three relationships. You need. You need someone who's you sit at the feet of, who's walked further than you, who knows, who knows more than you, that you can feed feed from. If you don't have that, you become the sole arbytry of truth, then you're you're not that clever. You need people, you need You need people who look who look in the eye of you. You need friends who will call you an idiot when you're being an idiot, and will call you out for your nonsense and will stop you making huge mistakes. And you won't punch them in the face when they call you know, because you love them right, and then you need people you pour yourself into. And that's that's something we miss all the time, because if you don't pour yourself into people, you don't retain the things you know. The protege principle will tell you you forget almost everything someone teaches you until you teach someone else. If you teach someone else, you not only retain the things that you know, but also you stop yourself becoming like relationally obese. Because everyone's pouring themselves into you, you want to pour yourself out into into other people. So I would say you need those you need those kind of three relationships, and you need some honest feedback because you don't know what you don't know what does it feel like to be the other side of me? How to how am I coming? You might think you're coming across as really generous, and people think you're tight and mean, and you might think that you're you're being kind and you're not being kind, you're just being nice. There's a difference there.
00:15:40
Speaker 3: I tell that to her all the time. Thank you, Carl.
00:15:42
Speaker 1: I really it's so fascinating Carl though, because when you love someone and they can become a mirror you can you can be willing in those moments to step outside of yourself and say, wow, how would that feel to have just heard what I just said, or to have a reaction to what I just or how I just said it? And only then can you actually realize, WHOA, that wasn't what I meant, but that is how it was received. And I have to own that. I'm curious about just this. I think so often I've seen on social media in my own personal life, everyone has been so quick it seems to want to become a victim, like that is their identity. These victim Olympics, these oppression Olympics, Well guess what happened to me? And I just I get so worried because it's such an easy, almost seductive way to look at things, because you don't have to be responsible. Then, right, I'm a victim of the situation. I'm a victim of my environment. How do you get yourself out of that rut? Because I do think it feels safe, but it's so disempowering, and yet people can't seem to get themselves out of it. And I put myself in that category as well. I think we've all been there in moments. I'm just I'm looking for some guidance into that and how people can recognize it and get out of it.
00:17:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, once again, a longer conversation. But we tend to be so myopic and egocentric that we think the world's against us, or the world's all about us, or I think one of the things I use with my clients is assume clumsy, not malice, and you'll win the day again and again and again, because because the three word phrase that's the most powerful phrase on the planet right now is I am offended. When someone's offended, then then we're all done and we're all gone, and I am offended, right, And actually, I am offended keeps us from deep relationships. It keeps us from the conflict necessary for life. We don't know how to do conflict. We don't know how to listen to one another, we don't know how to debate anymore. And and it's this I am offended thing that the stopping. So I use this acronym c I A CIA control influence except cotrol. The things you can control, control them within an inch of their life. Right, if it's your responsibility, you can do something about what you What can you control basically your reactions and your responses. Right, you can't control how they feel or what they think or what they thought or what they think happened. Influence, influence the things you can influence. So I can't. There's you know, I got four daughters, right, there was an age, a stage when they were really tiny, when I could control most things. That was very tiny. Then they started to have opinions, right, opinions, And then and then you can begin to influence some things. And it's all influence. It's all to do with what you model and what you message and how you live your life and how you printed them right, and and then there's a whole bunch of things you cannot control. Stop leaving, losing sleep over things that you haven't you have to just to have to accept. So yeah, I think it's I think it's massive. I think the victim mentality. The answer to the victim mentality is take take full responsibility for your stuff. If you can show up and say do you know what? I know who I am, I know what I'm for, I know how I love, and I know what I need to learn, you become unbreakable. You have nothing to prove, nothing to lose. And nothing to hide anymore. And now you can say what you want about me, But I know who I am right, and I'm because I'm so strong that I can receive some stuff and grow from some stuff. And I'm not defending some stuff, but I'm not pretending. And then I am no longer a victim to your purpose and a victim to your stuff. I'm holding my stuff and carrying my stuff into the world. Now you have to do it with kindness, because otherwise you become an ass and no one wants that.
00:19:51
Speaker 3: You know what, how I was gonna I'm glad you said kindness there at the end. It seems simple. I guess it's not inherent. We aren't all born like that. But how difficult do you find? Actually? What are your the four things? True, brave, kind, and curious. You said those are the four core leadership qualities. In those four what do you find oftentimes is missing most when you talk to these CEOs and athletes and leaders of that true, brave, kind and curious. It sounds so simple.
00:20:25
Speaker 2: Wow, Yeah, well, I think a lot. I think for the most most part, all those things are missing. But we can talk more about that. But I think, what what? What I do. What I see happen, particularly in corporate America, is when I use the word kind they roll their eyes and I go, oh, so you think this is a Then they call it a soft skill, and they relegate it to the HR department and go, oh, we can do you know, the kind thing, we can do over here, right, and and I'll tell you why it's killing their business because then I then I start putting numbers on kindness and so, oh, well, you're missing out a return on investment because you're not looking after you people. They don't feel psychologically safe, they don't feel seen, heard and honored. They're showing up without creative ideas because you shut them down all the time. There's no sense of being able to read a room or read another person, or be in it for them. So there is a lack of trust in the space, and therefore we've got a problem. So kindness is under indexed and vitally important. I would say that the catalyzing quality of those four qualities is curiosity, because here's the thing. Here's the thing. You can be true, and you can be brave, and you can be kind, and I can teach you to do that. I can teach you to know yourself and lead yourself. I can teach you to find out what your purpose is, what the point of view is, and focus on it. I can teach you to read a room, even those who think they're numbers people. I can teach you to be a people person. I can teach you empathy. I can teach you to understand what's going on. I can teach you emotions. But you'll never be truer, braver, and kinder until you get curious, until every day is a school day, until you every experience that remains un processed stays unlearned. So until you're able to process things and go well, I wonder why that happened or what would happen if that, you can't be creative and you cannot grow. So curiosity is the magic, is the force multiplier.
00:22:15
Speaker 1: Wow, And I was just thinking as you were talking about curiosity, that really isn't that the suspension of judgment? And I'm terrible at that, Like we want to go straight to a judgment because we feel safe, because those are the rules by which we operate. But if you suspend judgment, you can be curious. But as long as you're in that judgment mindset, and I'm in it a lot. I will admit that you can't be curious.
00:22:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, and amy, I teach all the time. You know, assumption. Someone once taught someone along the line that assume makes an ass out of you and me. Right, Yeah, peace of nonsense. Assume makes the world go around. I assume gravity. I got out of bed in the morning. I assume my wife loves me. I stay married. I assume, I assume. I assume everything I do is an assumption. It's what you marry an assumption too. That's the killer. If you marry an assumption to a judgment, you shut down thinking, You shut down possibility, and you shut down relationships. You close everything down. If you marry an assumption to a curiosity, you ope everything, open everything up. It becomes a completely different conversation. And so curiosity is like this secret source which helps us become child like but not childish. We begin to wonder again and go, gosh, what could be possible. I've got a client and friend who learned how to be an airline pilot at the age of sixty four years of age, not because he found it easy, but because he found it difficult, Because he wanted to be curious, he wanted to keep his mind curious, he wanted to learn new things. So yeah, I think.
00:23:42
Speaker 1: That's so cool. Yeah, I just had a light bulb go off, like really truly a light bulb go off. I have another question for you. It'll be my last question I have for you. Do you have a leader out there that you look to as the best leader we've got right now in the world. Is there's someone who you think does it better than anyone else, that you would emulate or that you would show people to look to this person.
00:24:08
Speaker 2: Wow, I have a couple of clients, which I'm not going to name because that would be really unhelpful, but I do. I mean, there's a guy I'm thinking of who was the COO I think CEO of one of the largest organizations in the world that I coach, who is absolutely fantastic because he's right brain, left brain, because he's strategy and spirit, because he's got this kind of people and process stuff, and he really cares about people. So I would point you to anyone that puts people first, anyone that says people is the point I would because I think the future belongs to those kind of people. I Actually, I think that probably a hybrid of a whole number of different people. People carry different things. I was once asked, maybe about five years ago by a significant CEO what books I would recommend for their a program. They wanted one book, one book that will these guys could read, and I said, there isn't one. There isn't one. I recommend Brenny Brown on this, I'd recommend I Grant on this. I'd recommend, you know, go here for here, Jim Collins on this and that. And so I wrote the book I wrote recently related to recently was because I didn't find anything that actually did something that was core and central and said, if you learned these things, you can piggyback off these things and build on these things. So I think it's probably hybrid of these things. And I think it's a bit of a mess out there, to be honest, naming.
00:25:32
Speaker 1: It certainly is. But you helped us navigate through so much of it. I mean, I'm going to go back and re listen to this podcast and take notes because you just had so much brilliant advice for people who are trying to be leaders within their own family, leaders just of their own being. So we can all use this advice. It's not just about CEOs and folks who are at the top, right, This.
00:25:58
Speaker 2: Is totally mean. My clients basically employ me to help them with a business thing, and three sessions they talk to me about their marriage and their kids, because it all it's one thing, right, It's all one thing. It's integris, it's it's consistent Integris.
00:26:13
Speaker 1: Well, Carl Martin, what an honor to have met you. We appreciate your time, we appreciate your wisdom. Thank you so much for helping us navigate our spiritual Sunday.
00:26:24
Speaker 2: Love that love you guys, Bless you
Speaker 1: Welcome everybody to our Spiritual Sunday series. We've got another edition. We're very excited about this. We are hoping that on Sundays you all can tune in get a little inspiration, a little guidance. We've got tough headlines that hit us all week long and certainly we all got personal issues. So it's fun to get some clarity, some vision from folks who are a lot smarter than us. And today we are interviewing Carl Martin. He's a leadership coach, he's a speaker, he's an author, he's a former senior pastor of Central Church in Edinburgh, Scotland. But he's got a consultancy. A consultancy I can't talk. A consultancy group that works with big CEOs, athletes, you name it, and helps them, guides them through leadership mentorship? Is that leadership mentorship? Leadership stuck? Let's get Carl to help me with the words that I cannot bind today. That's what you do for a living. Carl, thank you for being with us. We appreciate you being here.
00:01:07
Speaker 2: It's wonderful to be with you. Guys. I'll help you with your words.
00:01:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, teacher, you could have stepped in and helped me.
00:01:11
Speaker 3: No, no, no, I.
00:01:12
Speaker 2: Like to just smiling while I'm swirling down the marriage advice.
00:01:20
Speaker 3: You know, I just wanted her to see how badly she depends on me in life. I just want her to struggle a little bit.
00:01:25
Speaker 2: There, Carl, Stop digging, Stop digging.
00:01:28
Speaker 3: But Carl, what do you see when you talk to these folks who are in leadership positions? How often our leadership characteristics missing from people who are in leadership positions?
00:01:41
Speaker 2: Yeah? Almost always, TJ. Like we leadership is the greatest of all human skills and abilities, and we don't teach it, and so we assume it, and then we only ever teach it as a catch up exercise when someone gets a job called leader, and then we teach them skills. We don't teach them heartset, soul set, mindset stuff. And so, for instance, if you teach someone profit and loss and you don't teach them honesty and integrity, you create a piece of health for yourself. And we see that all over the place. Leadership crisis not because people don't have the skills, but because they don't have the character to carry the skills. And so that's why you've got political leaders in crisis, business leaders in crisis, church leaders in crisis, family leaders in crisis because no one helped them and they didn't stop to do their work.
00:02:27
Speaker 3: Karl, can I ask on that because people I hear this phrase all the time as you were talking natural born leaders?
00:02:34
Speaker 2: Right?
00:02:35
Speaker 3: Is that a thing? Or is that type of leadership skill and character you're talking about is something that is actually cultivated at some point in your life, whether you were a child or a college.
00:02:43
Speaker 2: Or which just is totally a thing. I mean every if it's true of every single person on this planet. The moment you start to walk, breathe, talk for yourself, you lead yourself, you inspire yourself, you impact other people you lead. So this idea that there are certain people who are leaders and certain people are not leaders, and certain characteristics of leadership. Now there were different kinds of leadership, different capacities of leadership. And the day you stop thinking you have to lead yourself and lead someone else's the day you should give up and go home. So it's a quiet, it's developed, and it's formed. I think the word formation is really important. How do you form your leadership?
00:03:21
Speaker 1: It's intentional, you know, I think everyone listening can agree. It doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on that we are in desperate need for leaders in this country. We've been dealing with a lot of headlines, among them the cyclospora outbreak, and DJ and I have been saying as we've been covering these headlines, we need someone to step forward and be a leader here and give us guidance. And we look for that during the pandemic, we look for that. Now we're in the middle of a war, or can we even call it a war? Why is it so hard to have someone stand up and be that leader we're all looking for? And yes, integrity is a huge part of that. I'm so glad you mentioned that.
00:04:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's because we forgot how to be human. It's because it's because in the moment of a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world, AI wars, tariffs, borders, you know, the whole bangshoot of stuff. The future is going to belong to the people who are most human, the people who know what it means to be a human being, know what it means to build human relationships, know what it means to be honest about this stuff. Wisdom and impact flows out of honesty. And humility and honesty and humility is I'm a broken person and I'm a beautiful and I'm a beautiful person because I'm created in the image of it. I believe a beautiful God, right. And so humility is not thinking less of yourself or thinking of yourself less. Humility is thinking correctly about yourself. So we're living in a world where people don't know who they are, what they're for, how they should show up, and so show up with masks. They pretend they're hiding something, proving something, or afraid to lose something. And therefore you get performative leaders, populist leaders, people who are playing to the crowd rather than doing the right thing. And so it's going to take it's going to take I don't I don't know. I mean, I work with this generation of leaders, and I spend an awful lot of time banging heads against walls and saying that's a piece of nonsense, Stop doing that. I think it's actually going to take us almost skipping a generation and saying let's let's let's teach and train our kids how to be true, brave, kind and curious. Let's teach them how to navigate a world Let's teach them how to be honest and integerous. Let's teach them how to be kind and empathic. Let's teach them how to be bold and make aggressive mistakes, not passive ones. Let's teach them how to be curious. Let's teach him how to Let's teach them how to wonder at the world and continue to wonder all the days of their life, so that they never come to an end of it. And then you're going to create people that you can attach almost every skill set at too, and it will stick and it will make a difference. But we we are so screwed up. And I think how kids are recognizing that? Right? I think how kids go? We don't want to be like you, We want to do the things you did. Let's do something anyway, I'm over talking, but that's what I think.
00:06:16
Speaker 1: It's fascinating.
00:06:18
Speaker 3: Well, you said, we're so screwed up there, Carl, But how do we unscrew it? Seems like we are still going in the direction we shouldn't be for a while. I don't know when and how or where do you see? You said a generation? But where does a course correction potentially even begin?
00:06:36
Speaker 2: Well, I think we're I think in essence that we're super smart people and we're actually really kind people, and I think we've got to stop pretending we're not. And some states we need to have a conversation with ourselves and say, look, we're the project, but we're not the point. Let's address the issues in ourselves. Let's look at our nation, and let's I mean, like, this thing here is killing us, right, I mean, the kids say, are my kids that say I'm sorry phone? Yeah, my kids say, I'm totally obsessed with this thing, right, and it is killing us because it is just polarizing every thought. Right, I don't care what side of the isle you come from, but this just agrees with everything I think and sells me everything I think, to the point where we go further and further and further away from each other, and now we can't have a conversation and we cancel each other, and so we've become incredibly immature. And someone needs to have a conversation about these things. These things are killing us.
00:07:27
Speaker 1: You know.
00:07:27
Speaker 2: I don't care what side of the ale you come from, you know, And I actually think that I actually think that most people are not on the sides of the ales. They're in the middle somewhere and they're going, why have I been forced to think it's either this or this when it's usually not this or this, it's yes, it's yes, an end, and let's have a conversation about these things. So I think we have to have a couple some conversations. I think the work that my clients are doing with me is very brave of them to be honest, that they're having conversations with themselves around stuff that really matters.
00:07:59
Speaker 1: And yeah, no, Carl, I think that is that's the point for everyone listening, for the two of us listening to you that it does. It has to begin with the individual, and you have to look at yourself. You can't be pointing the finger at everyone else. It's easy to say what everyone else is doing wrong. We have to take account and take accountability for what we're doing wrong individually. Do you think a lot of it is that we're all operating out of fear. It's a fear based mentality. Fear we're going to be found out that we're not as smart, we're not as sharp, we're not as talented, and so we posture and we put on these masks because we're afraid, and we're afraid to admit we're afraid totally.
00:08:39
Speaker 2: And so I would just say, let's level the playing field. I talk to people all the time. There are two particular things that come at me. One is imposter syndrome and the other is narcissism. Right, and so there's a bunch of other things, but impostas and Mason right. And the answer that I give them back is, of course, you're an impost Stop trying to pretend you're not. I'm an impost You're an apost or. All impostors, right, Let's put that on the table. If everyone knew everything about my life, we wouldn't be talking right now. If you know every thought I had, every you wouldn't want to talk to me. You won't want to be around my life. Right, So we're an impostor. Get that on the table and recognize that everyone's broken. And now we've got a great conversation about to happen. The imposter scripts are running, We've all got it. I always think, if they find out about my staff, you know, and then on the other side of the equation, the narcissists, all my particularly male clients who are wealthy, successful, they get accused of being narcissists. They're not narcissists. There's about one percent of this world that the clinical narcissists, right, But we're all narcissists. We live in a narcissistic world where where I am at the center of my world and I'm trying to protect myself and you do you and we have to have those conversations because it's killing us. And so I think there, I mean, basically, I think there are three relationships you have to deal with if you're going to correct this thing. Relationship number one, deal with yourself. Have a good conversation with yourself. Who am I really? Why am I that way? Why do I get triggered by the same things, Why do I play the same games, Why do I keep getting the same results? How am I being experienced by people? What does it feel like to be the other side of me? So those kind of conversations are really important. Second conversation, who are my people? Because we have so atomized our relationships that we've stopped doing community. We don't know how to do the wider family thing. We don't know how to have people speaking into our lives. Jim Rowan once said, you're the some of the five people closest to you. I think that's true, and it's also not true enough with some of everyone. We're allowed to speak into our lives, and not enough people are speaking into our lives. We don't know how to build community, We don't know how to have the relationships that we need. We've polarized our relationships to the point where we become echo chambers. So deal with those relationships, and then the final thing that you know. You wouldn't be surprised with me saying I think you have to have a conversation with what you think about God, what you think about something bigger. And you know I have a personal relationship with Jesus and I don't for this instance, I don't care whether you do or not. But if you don't have God, you become God. And that's and you're a crap God. So it's not working for you. There was a preacher years ago, a guy called a w Toza, who used to say, this thing, what you think about when you think about God is the most important thing you ever think. Now, I don't think he was just trying to get your order to become a Christians. I think he was saying what you think about when you think about God frames what you think about yourself. It frames what you think about this world. It frames what you think about your confidence. It brings you security in the storm. It gives you opportunities to build something that's bigger than yourself. So those I mean, I'm preaching that, but those those three relationships really important. You're the project, but you're not the point. Deal with yourself, all issues in yourself. There's no such thing as an individual. There is only community. Whatever Margaret that you're one said, there is only you know, I have clients who are very successful sports men and women. There's no individual sport on the planet. Rory McElroy has a caddy, a shrink pilot, a thing. You know, there's no there's no solo artist, right, there is no solo artist. There are backing singers, there are writers, there are there are these things don't exist. You don't exist except for the relationships around you. You cannot exist properly. And we've we've underestimated this, and we've because we've we've vilified collectivism and socialism and all that stuff has been so bad that we've we've lost community, we've lost a sense of collectiveness and so we have to recover that, and then the god thing is just vital for me.
00:12:44
Speaker 3: And on the point the first thing you started with, you said you have to have a kind of an honest conversation with yourself. And my question is, can you give people some tips on how to make sure that is an honest conversation because oftentimes we find people won't. They're looking to blame, well this happened to me, or I'm like this because my parents did this or whatever else. Can you give folks tips on making sure that first part that you mentioned you're doing correctly and having an honest conversation.
00:13:20
Speaker 2: Obviously totally Well, this will be a much longer podcast. But but but two things that would be helpful starters. One is, you are not your personality profile. You are not your personality profile. You are not your personality profile. That is not the truth. Okay, it's a lens. If it becomes the truth, it becomes a box from which you cannot a scape on which you judge everyone else. So so you know these things are lenses, they're not truth. So understanding that and understanding that it's probably truer that you are the product of the things you have believed, your your your ideologies, the wounds you carry, your injuries, and the influences you have the people around you. That that's probably at a conversation who's been influencing you? What have been saying? What do I believe about life? Where did I get hurt and wounded? And where do I run away from? So that's that's almost a therapy conversation. But that's the thing. The second thing I think is you have to have some trusted people in your life who tell you the truth and and and they you know. So I talk about three relationships. You need. You need someone who's you sit at the feet of, who's walked further than you, who knows, who knows more than you, that you can feed feed from. If you don't have that, you become the sole arbytry of truth, then you're you're not that clever. You need people, you need You need people who look who look in the eye of you. You need friends who will call you an idiot when you're being an idiot, and will call you out for your nonsense and will stop you making huge mistakes. And you won't punch them in the face when they call you know, because you love them right, and then you need people you pour yourself into. And that's that's something we miss all the time, because if you don't pour yourself into people, you don't retain the things you know. The protege principle will tell you you forget almost everything someone teaches you until you teach someone else. If you teach someone else, you not only retain the things that you know, but also you stop yourself becoming like relationally obese. Because everyone's pouring themselves into you, you want to pour yourself out into into other people. So I would say you need those you need those kind of three relationships, and you need some honest feedback because you don't know what you don't know what does it feel like to be the other side of me? How to how am I coming? You might think you're coming across as really generous, and people think you're tight and mean, and you might think that you're you're being kind and you're not being kind, you're just being nice. There's a difference there.
00:15:40
Speaker 3: I tell that to her all the time. Thank you, Carl.
00:15:42
Speaker 1: I really it's so fascinating Carl though, because when you love someone and they can become a mirror you can you can be willing in those moments to step outside of yourself and say, wow, how would that feel to have just heard what I just said, or to have a reaction to what I just or how I just said it? And only then can you actually realize, WHOA, that wasn't what I meant, but that is how it was received. And I have to own that. I'm curious about just this. I think so often I've seen on social media in my own personal life, everyone has been so quick it seems to want to become a victim, like that is their identity. These victim Olympics, these oppression Olympics, Well guess what happened to me? And I just I get so worried because it's such an easy, almost seductive way to look at things, because you don't have to be responsible. Then, right, I'm a victim of the situation. I'm a victim of my environment. How do you get yourself out of that rut? Because I do think it feels safe, but it's so disempowering, and yet people can't seem to get themselves out of it. And I put myself in that category as well. I think we've all been there in moments. I'm just I'm looking for some guidance into that and how people can recognize it and get out of it.
00:17:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, once again, a longer conversation. But we tend to be so myopic and egocentric that we think the world's against us, or the world's all about us, or I think one of the things I use with my clients is assume clumsy, not malice, and you'll win the day again and again and again, because because the three word phrase that's the most powerful phrase on the planet right now is I am offended. When someone's offended, then then we're all done and we're all gone, and I am offended, right, And actually, I am offended keeps us from deep relationships. It keeps us from the conflict necessary for life. We don't know how to do conflict. We don't know how to listen to one another, we don't know how to debate anymore. And and it's this I am offended thing that the stopping. So I use this acronym c I A CIA control influence except cotrol. The things you can control, control them within an inch of their life. Right, if it's your responsibility, you can do something about what you What can you control basically your reactions and your responses. Right, you can't control how they feel or what they think or what they thought or what they think happened. Influence, influence the things you can influence. So I can't. There's you know, I got four daughters, right, there was an age, a stage when they were really tiny, when I could control most things. That was very tiny. Then they started to have opinions, right, opinions, And then and then you can begin to influence some things. And it's all influence. It's all to do with what you model and what you message and how you live your life and how you printed them right, and and then there's a whole bunch of things you cannot control. Stop leaving, losing sleep over things that you haven't you have to just to have to accept. So yeah, I think it's I think it's massive. I think the victim mentality. The answer to the victim mentality is take take full responsibility for your stuff. If you can show up and say do you know what? I know who I am, I know what I'm for, I know how I love, and I know what I need to learn, you become unbreakable. You have nothing to prove, nothing to lose. And nothing to hide anymore. And now you can say what you want about me, But I know who I am right, and I'm because I'm so strong that I can receive some stuff and grow from some stuff. And I'm not defending some stuff, but I'm not pretending. And then I am no longer a victim to your purpose and a victim to your stuff. I'm holding my stuff and carrying my stuff into the world. Now you have to do it with kindness, because otherwise you become an ass and no one wants that.
00:19:51
Speaker 3: You know what, how I was gonna I'm glad you said kindness there at the end. It seems simple. I guess it's not inherent. We aren't all born like that. But how difficult do you find? Actually? What are your the four things? True, brave, kind, and curious. You said those are the four core leadership qualities. In those four what do you find oftentimes is missing most when you talk to these CEOs and athletes and leaders of that true, brave, kind and curious. It sounds so simple.
00:20:25
Speaker 2: Wow, Yeah, well, I think a lot. I think for the most most part, all those things are missing. But we can talk more about that. But I think, what what? What I do. What I see happen, particularly in corporate America, is when I use the word kind they roll their eyes and I go, oh, so you think this is a Then they call it a soft skill, and they relegate it to the HR department and go, oh, we can do you know, the kind thing, we can do over here, right, and and I'll tell you why it's killing their business because then I then I start putting numbers on kindness and so, oh, well, you're missing out a return on investment because you're not looking after you people. They don't feel psychologically safe, they don't feel seen, heard and honored. They're showing up without creative ideas because you shut them down all the time. There's no sense of being able to read a room or read another person, or be in it for them. So there is a lack of trust in the space, and therefore we've got a problem. So kindness is under indexed and vitally important. I would say that the catalyzing quality of those four qualities is curiosity, because here's the thing. Here's the thing. You can be true, and you can be brave, and you can be kind, and I can teach you to do that. I can teach you to know yourself and lead yourself. I can teach you to find out what your purpose is, what the point of view is, and focus on it. I can teach you to read a room, even those who think they're numbers people. I can teach you to be a people person. I can teach you empathy. I can teach you to understand what's going on. I can teach you emotions. But you'll never be truer, braver, and kinder until you get curious, until every day is a school day, until you every experience that remains un processed stays unlearned. So until you're able to process things and go well, I wonder why that happened or what would happen if that, you can't be creative and you cannot grow. So curiosity is the magic, is the force multiplier.
00:22:15
Speaker 1: Wow, And I was just thinking as you were talking about curiosity, that really isn't that the suspension of judgment? And I'm terrible at that, Like we want to go straight to a judgment because we feel safe, because those are the rules by which we operate. But if you suspend judgment, you can be curious. But as long as you're in that judgment mindset, and I'm in it a lot. I will admit that you can't be curious.
00:22:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, and amy, I teach all the time. You know, assumption. Someone once taught someone along the line that assume makes an ass out of you and me. Right, Yeah, peace of nonsense. Assume makes the world go around. I assume gravity. I got out of bed in the morning. I assume my wife loves me. I stay married. I assume, I assume. I assume everything I do is an assumption. It's what you marry an assumption too. That's the killer. If you marry an assumption to a judgment, you shut down thinking, You shut down possibility, and you shut down relationships. You close everything down. If you marry an assumption to a curiosity, you ope everything, open everything up. It becomes a completely different conversation. And so curiosity is like this secret source which helps us become child like but not childish. We begin to wonder again and go, gosh, what could be possible. I've got a client and friend who learned how to be an airline pilot at the age of sixty four years of age, not because he found it easy, but because he found it difficult, Because he wanted to be curious, he wanted to keep his mind curious, he wanted to learn new things. So yeah, I think.
00:23:42
Speaker 1: That's so cool. Yeah, I just had a light bulb go off, like really truly a light bulb go off. I have another question for you. It'll be my last question I have for you. Do you have a leader out there that you look to as the best leader we've got right now in the world. Is there's someone who you think does it better than anyone else, that you would emulate or that you would show people to look to this person.
00:24:08
Speaker 2: Wow, I have a couple of clients, which I'm not going to name because that would be really unhelpful, but I do. I mean, there's a guy I'm thinking of who was the COO I think CEO of one of the largest organizations in the world that I coach, who is absolutely fantastic because he's right brain, left brain, because he's strategy and spirit, because he's got this kind of people and process stuff, and he really cares about people. So I would point you to anyone that puts people first, anyone that says people is the point I would because I think the future belongs to those kind of people. I Actually, I think that probably a hybrid of a whole number of different people. People carry different things. I was once asked, maybe about five years ago by a significant CEO what books I would recommend for their a program. They wanted one book, one book that will these guys could read, and I said, there isn't one. There isn't one. I recommend Brenny Brown on this, I'd recommend I Grant on this. I'd recommend, you know, go here for here, Jim Collins on this and that. And so I wrote the book I wrote recently related to recently was because I didn't find anything that actually did something that was core and central and said, if you learned these things, you can piggyback off these things and build on these things. So I think it's probably hybrid of these things. And I think it's a bit of a mess out there, to be honest, naming.
00:25:32
Speaker 1: It certainly is. But you helped us navigate through so much of it. I mean, I'm going to go back and re listen to this podcast and take notes because you just had so much brilliant advice for people who are trying to be leaders within their own family, leaders just of their own being. So we can all use this advice. It's not just about CEOs and folks who are at the top, right, This.
00:25:58
Speaker 2: Is totally mean. My clients basically employ me to help them with a business thing, and three sessions they talk to me about their marriage and their kids, because it all it's one thing, right, It's all one thing. It's integris, it's it's consistent Integris.
00:26:13
Speaker 1: Well, Carl Martin, what an honor to have met you. We appreciate your time, we appreciate your wisdom. Thank you so much for helping us navigate our spiritual Sunday.
00:26:24
Speaker 2: Love that love you guys, Bless you