The Art and Power of Connecting

Intro (00:09):
Welcome to Innovations and Breakthroughs with your host Rich Goldstein, talking about the evolutionary, the revolutionary, the inspiration and the perspiration, and those aha moments that change everything. And now here’s your host, Rich Goldstein.

Rich (00:33):
Rich Goldstein here, host of the Innovations and Breakthroughs podcast, where I feature top leaders in the path they took to create change. Past guests include Joe Polish, Roland Frazier, Mitch Russo, and Heather Pierce Campbell. This episode is brought to you by my company, Goldstein Patent Law, where we help you to protect your ideas and products. We’ve advised and obtained patents for thousands of companies over the past 28 years. So if you’re a company that has software or product or design you want protected, go to goldstein patent law.com where there are amazing free resources for learning about the patent process. And you could email my team welcome@goldsteinpc.com to explore. It’s a match to work together. You could also check out the book I wrote for the American Bar Association that explains in plain English how patents work. It’s called the ABA Consumer Guide to Obtaining a Patent I have with me here today, Lou Diamond. Lou is the CEO of Thrive, which is a company that’s focused on helping brands become even more amazing through the power of connecting. He’s a host of the Thrive Loud podcast where he interviews newsmakers entrepreneurs, celebrities, and everyday people doing extraordinary things. And amazingly, he puts out three episodes a week of his podcast, which just blows my mind. Uh, Lou is the author of the new book, Speakeasy Connect With Every Conversation. It’s my pleasure to welcome here today, Lou Diamond. Welcome Lou.

Lou (01:59):
Hey, Rich. Thank you so much for having me here. It is mind blowing, right? The, the amount of episodes we do a day, a week,

Rich (02:05):
It really is. I mean, it takes a lot to keep up with one episode a week and you do three, so it,

Lou (02:10):
It just enables me to have more conversations with really great people. There you go.

Rich (02:14):
Yeah, exactly. Which is kind of walking the walk, right? I mean, um, I, I think you, your main message is about the power of conversation. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, and what’s possible through conversation. So kind of like how did you get there? How did you end up, um, like discovering that and, and becoming passionate about, uh, about, um, making that your message to other people?

Lou (02:38):
Well, I, I’d have to rewind a little bit to, to give you a background and, and I’ll do the, the, the fast bio. Before I started my company Thrive, uh, I worked in consulting, which I would always argue is like connecting companies. Uh, I, there was that thing called the internet that happened in the late nineties, which started, and I actually worked for a firm that helped to build some of the original, original websites. Uh, very much involved in financial services. And after that I went to Wall Street and I worked, uh, in sales and trading for Merrill Lynch and then Bank of America Merrill Lynch combined together, uh, got to see a tremendous amount of opportunities. I was always a sales slash marketing person in that space and a very good producer at that. And the world I had been in I knew was unique and it was, there was a reason I went to it because obviously, you know, you’re gonna either, if you wanna make a lot of money in this world, I was told a long time ago, you either work for yourself or you work on Wall Street, that, that was maybe an older adage because I know technology may have, uh, come in, you know, you could say do a startup to do that, but that was something that I guess was true for a period of time.

Lou (03:50):
If you’re going to give up and work for another person, you might as well make sure you get paid for it. And, uh, and, and I reaped good benefits from that. And it was a great experience and incredible opportunity. However, I felt there was something inside of me screaming to come out and that was, I needed to do more than just work within that world that I was in. So it turned out also that I was a top performer, but I wasn’t the type of person you would think would be a top performer or I wasn’t the type of person you would actually say, Well, he’s a salesperson. I had a very unique way of creating relationships and connections with the people that I did business with always. And it managed to keep it over the years. Well, when I was trying to figure out kind of what I wanted to do next, cuz I felt the world I had been in was limiting and changing and something was screaming for me to come out, I actually ended up helping a colleague of mine and went to a trade show event, helped to met that trade show event and deployed a lot of the skills that I just naturally think I just do when I go to connect with other people.

Lou (04:52):
And when I finished that trade show and on the flight back from Las Vegas to New York, we upgraded our seats because while I was there I helped him ink two deals, which closed four or five within 30 days, I think was the, the term from who we met at that show. And he said to me with a pen and piece of paper, he goes, You need to write down what it is that you do because there’s something unique in the way that you’re doing things that I don’t think you think is, is unique and you need to tell the world about it. That is what helped me launch and start the impetus of my business, which is thrive. And what helped me to write my first book, which was called Master the Art of Connecting, where I actually kind of decoded what you need to do to be a better connector, how to tap into a lot of what I call the connecting core muscles, rich and you.

Lou (05:45):
And whether you’re, you’re speaking to somebody, whether you’re selling something, whether you’re marketing something, or whether you’re leading another individual. And that led to me helping lots of other sales and marketing organizations cuz that’s what I do. I help sales and marketing organizations really better connect cuz I’m a consultant in that space. And I speak and I write about connecting. And over the years in what I’ve learned and found out was something else more specific, Rich in doing a lot more work and really focusing on this space after leaving Wall Street. And that is, I figured out where every single connection in our lives begins. I figured you were gonna ask

Rich (06:25):
Me. There’s so much, Well there’s so much to unpack there. It’s like, you know, my a d brain is saying like, Wait, but what was the, you know, thing before? Well, well first of all, I, I think, um, uh, you know what, like, what’s really interesting is that your friend said like, Hey, you’ve gotta write it down. And I think for a lot of us, when we have, when we have some type of, um, ability, we often don’t really know how we do it.

Lou (06:50):
I agree.

Rich (06:50):
We can’t explain it. Uh, and so he, he kind of, uh, had you do something which is really extraordinary, which is to try and break it down and create, uh, create steps out of it. Um, so, you know, I, and, and that’s I think, uh, to me one of the extraordinary parts of your journey is that there was a moment where you said, Okay, I need to actually figure out what I do and how I do it. Um,

Lou (07:14):
Yeah, and, and a lot of us I think, look, you know, you, you focus on this about the uniqueness of products on this program and innovative ways of doing something really cool and different and in the work that you do in patents. So when you’re dealing with a, a way that you’re communicating or the way you’re establishing relationships and connections, first I had to validate was what I was doing unique and was it something that could be spread onto others and something that could be taught, You know, the expression, uh, Rich, you’ve probably heard this growing up in your life. You know, you can’t teach someone how to sell. You’re either born with it or you’re not. Mm-hmm.

Rich (07:55):
<affirmative>. Yep.

Lou (07:56):
I don’t know if that’s true or not, but what I’ve learned in what I’ve done over the last several years with Thrive is that I learned that to connect that can be coached, you can coach people or train or message and explain people and practice the skill of how to actually better connect. And I started inching into it because I figured out where it all starts and all the connections in our lives begin at one central point, which that central point is a conversation. We don’t think of conversations as often as we do in our lives, cuz we kind of have a lot of them. Right. You talked to lots of people probably during the day, and as a podcast host, you’ve probably really made a lot of connections. We’ll, we’ll dive into that in a, in a bit. Yep. But think about our work life and all the people that you interact with, uh, throughout a day.

Lou (08:48):
The person, you know, you the, you wake up with someone <laugh>, you have a conversation with them, your children, your dog, your, your, your commuter, the barrister who makes your coffee, all the people you’ll have these little conversations with. And obviously not every one of them leads to a connection. You know, they could be just passing or fleeting. And I started to recognize that, you know what, we’re missing Rich. We’re missing out on a lot of opportunities to have more connections in our lives because unfortunately, due to the world we’re in and the busyness of our lives and a lot of the digitalness of what we deal with, we are not actually having a lot of conversations as much as we used to. So therefore we’re kind of losing the ability to really appreciate how incredible a conversation is and we’re missing out on making connections and that opportunity.

Lou (09:40):
So in my work, I said to myself, You know, what’s real important? I learned originally how people connect when someone asked me to write it down. And after further double clicking down on understanding where connections work and how to be better at it, I really delve down into that area of what if every conversation we had led to a great connection led to the ability for us to get the job that we were interviewing for, to establish a really good relationship with a work colleague, to close the sale that we’re trying to make, to get the, you know, the, the people on board with your ideas and your groups to help people better work together, better understand, to be able to connect, engage and win every time you have a conversation. What if you can do that? And, and that was my goal of a lot of the work I was doing, but spur from the first book that I did. And then I recognize I figured it out and I’m actually gonna work on helping all these people understand what that was. So what ended up happening, Rich, was I learned something unbelievable. It had nothing to do with anything that we did. It had nothing to do with anything that we said to make every conversation connect with another, nothing to do with actions. That we would take tasks, we would practice, uh, tips or tricks or words or combinations of things that would make someone more likely to connect in a conversation and nothing to do with anything that we would do.

Rich (11:19):
Okay. I’m intrigued. So if it has nothing to do with anything that we do, then what is the key to having those connected conversations?

Lou (11:28):
The ability to connect with every conversation has everything to do with how we need to be before, during, and after you have a conversation.

Rich (11:42):
Okay. So we’re talking about being now. Yes. But we’ve, um, we’ve gone metaphysical, right?

Lou (11:49):
I don’t even see,

Rich (11:50):
Especially gone metaphysical.

Lou (11:50):
Yeah. It has to do with the way we think about the way our persona is when we enter into a conversation. Think of all the people you’ve had conversations with in your life and what makes somebody likable, attractive to you? What makes them want you to continue to have a conversation with them? What makes you want to actually have more conversations with these individuals? It’s not the things that they said or the actions that they took, or the great presentation they gave, or their unique design or patent idea that was there. There was something about the way that they were when they were communicating this topic to you in their conversation that resonated with you. And I use that word carefully, It resonated and it resonated because they did a lot of the things that they bring to the table us. And I’m not being metaphysical, like it’s woo woo and it’s energy and stuff.

Lou (12:44):
Right? It’s actual ways that we can consciously think about the way we should enter into every conversation that is what is going to enable us to, pun intended here, speak easy so that we can more likely connect with everyone we talk to. And I, to make it even simple, when I started to break down what I was, I, I found the multiple ways that they were, and I don’t wanna go through all of them here right. But I will let you know that there are pretty much at core five ways that you need to be to be able to connect in every one of these conversations. And when you work on them and you practice them and you prepare yourself to enter every conversation with this mindset, you will connect, engage and win each time you enter into a conversation with anyone.

Rich (13:28):
Yep. Absolutely. And so the, and by the way, my comment about the metaphysical is simply because a, a lot of people don’t have context for this. It’s so important being versus doing, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, a lot of people don’t have context for that. They see actions, um, they see, you know, like things you say right? Things you say things you do, which are part of, um, you know, things you say are part of things you do, but being is like, well, what is the way that you are that has you say those things and has you do those things? So I guess an example of being might be open, like you come into a conversation open. That’s a way of being, there’s no specific action to being open. It just open means that you are receptive, you are list, perhaps the things you do then is that you’re listening. You’re not interrupting people when they’re talking. Right. And you are, when their words are being said, a thing that you do if you’re open maybe is that you allow them to resonate and maybe you nod your head. Those are some doing things that come from the being of being open, Right? Absolutely. To give it some context, right? Yeah.

Lou (14:33):
And I’ll give you, I’ll give it a couple examples. I wasn’t gonna give you all five mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but, I’ll start off with the most important way to be when you enter in a conversation, actually is the first way you need to be. And that’s grateful. There are billions of people on this planet. There are limited amounts of of seconds that we have to breathe on it and live our lives in it. And the opportunity to have a conversation with someone is a gift. Every conversation you have with someone, the one we’re having right now, you and I are having, and it’s a gift between us. But here’s the real fun part. You’re listeners who are listening to this conversation, it’s a gift to them as well because they’re benefiting from the opportunity that you and I are having from having a conversation and sharing and being open and providing them with information that they could use to help them grow in their lives.

Lou (15:25):
When you make a connection, you are bringing your world and someone else’s world together. And that conversation is the linchpin of where it starts. And by being a certain way, and in this case, being grateful that you’re even in the room, does something. Think about when you’re grateful for something, when you’re thankful how you are, you’re appreciative, you are welcoming to your point, you’re even a little bit open at that point, but you’re also saying, I am honored to spend this time with Rich Goldstein here in this incredible show here and have a chance for me to voice these great lessons to his listeners. And what a gift that is for them, for you, for me to be able to connect in this moment, in this present moment. You know, you can get a little woo woo and funny and say that yes, every conversation is a gift.

Lou (16:09):
And when you’re being very present, maybe the word present and gift or related in that regard, right? Maybe every, the reason it’s called present is because it is a gift. Keep in mind that being grateful when you are that way, you approach the situation open, happy and appreciative. And people feel that, you know, when someone’s appreciative. Cuz let’s flip it around. You’ve had conversations with people where they feel like it’s a waste of your time or they don’t wanna be there, or it feels like this is silly and they don’t even know why they wanna be there and they’re not grateful or thankful for having the opportunity and not appreciating it in the moment. Which one do you think is more likely for you to wanna have a continued conversation with that individual after the conversation? The one where walk in grateful or the one where you just feel like it’s thankless and I don’t even wanna be there, Right?

Lou (16:57):
Yeah. The one where gratitude is present, clearly, of course we wanna be in a situation where in a welcoming environment and we show the appreciation because when we enter into conversations in that moment and say, I am glad I have the chance to do this today, you end up respecting that person’s time, their value, what they’re bringing, and the fact that they’re even just right there in, in that opportunity with you. And I state this too often, leaders, top sales people or marketers or whatnot, forget this aspect. They’re not grateful in the moment of a conversation and they don’t understand why that is. They feel, Oh, I’m gonna talk all about myself in this particular instance and you know, cuz I’ve got other things to do or other places to be, and maybe this isn’t gonna be a real value of my time. And when we do that, you don’t realize what that does in the conversation. It will disconnect one person to another. So that respect that you show is the first way you need to be when you wanna enter a conversation. So make it clear to begin a connection. You gotta be thankful and treat every conversation as a gift.

Rich (18:02):
Yeah. That’s amazing. And it, and it’s, it’s funny, I’m just thinking about, um, how we often have it backwards, right? We kind of go into the conversation and wait for the conversation to impress us, our conversation to make us grateful for it, right? Like for something magical to happen that has to say, Oh wow, that was a great conversation. So as opposed to if we’re coming in with the, um, the being of gratitude and already appreciating it, that’s when the conversation is magical.

Lou (18:35):
You feel good, right? When someone is appreciative of you that you know, when someone is thankful for your efforts, Let’s just make it clear how, how often do we say thank you to those that we are around every single day? And I’m just saying this in, in general, we can get a little selfish and forget to be appreciative of others that we work with, that we speak with, that we deal with all day long. And we forget to say thank you and make it clear. Sometimes that’s the reason why someone stays in an organization leaves or doesn’t actually come up with the creativeness because they don’t feel the sense of appreciation. And what I’ve learned with the people I’ve worked with is by always presenting that sense of gratitude and that any time you enter into a realm of a conversation with me, you’re gonna feel pretty grateful about that situation.

Lou (19:22):
And it’s also, the conversation’s gonna already start off on a good note, right? It seems like basic kindergarten stuff. I do understand that. Be thankful and be glad that you’re here. Yes. It’s what we should be. Our lives are not so busy and so self-centered that we should not forget and be appreciative of the fact that when I go into that conversation, I’m gonna learn something, I’m gonna gain something. And by the way, that connection could be helping me in some regard today, tomorrow, the next year, whatever it might be. And that’s something that, uh, I I wanted always to make sure, is that the epicenter of, of the ways you need to be when you connect?

Rich (20:02):
Yeah. Interesting. You know, what, what occurred to me is, um, my dad passed earlier this year. Yeah. I’m sorry. What? Thank you. And um, you know, we talk about like, you know, go going into a conversation with gratitude, like clearly I would be grateful to have another conversation with him. Yeah. And it doesn’t matter the substance of the conversation. But I can’t say, I always went into every conversation with him like that. Like, it’s like maybe there was some conversation we had. I’m like, Wow, that was awesome. Grateful for that, but now like I would be grateful for a conversation. Yeah. So it sounds like that’s the type of, of being that really makes things magical is as if like, you know, when you go into a conversation feeling like, wow, it’s amazing that we’re able to do this mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And you know, that’s just kind of what, what what lands for me is just thinking about that, like the kind of gratitude I would have for a conversation with him if I could bring that to other conversations, how they, how they would feel and, and the type of results we might get out of that.

Lou (21:03):
I would even argue that on top of not only the results that you would get, but keep in mind the goal of having one conversation is to establish a connection which will lead obviously to having more conversations with them. And you’ve had a lifetime of, of conversations and not long enough as you would argue mm-hmm. <affirmative> with someone that you really deeply care about for a very long time. And, and, and that’s a treasured moment. Well, it’s hard to have that with everyone in the world. Uh, and and that’s why we need to flip the script on that and say in those moments that we do have it, because we don’t know when our last conversation will be. We don’t know if we’re gonna have that opportunity again. We don’t know whether it’s a sales meeting, an opportunity present, an idea to pitch a business, um, situation, to interview with somebody to see if I could be presentable.

Lou (21:50):
These are the moments that we look at, and if we don’t step in with that appreciation in that moment, we run the risk that they won’t make that connection at that point and we’re gonna lose the opportunity to deal with it. Look, I’ve worked on Wall Street and trust me when I tell you, I’ve had conversations that have led to business deals that probably were not filled with a lot of gratitude and certainly wasn’t, I wasn’t appreciative in the moment and just kind of running through that component of it. They certainly weren’t as valuable as a lot of the conversation I’ve had since. And the ones where I have shown that gratitude and thankfulness for tho those deals probably led to more business as opposed to just a one off and a transactional type of relationship in the world we’re in today. We have to think of every conversation as the means and the currency, if you would, on how we can start to build a longer term business plan, a longer term revenue streams, All the things that we do, they all start at that connection point of a great conversation with gratitude.

Rich (22:45):
Yeah. Uh, it’s amazing. And I just love that concept of it, of, of coming in with that gratitude. And, um,

Lou (22:54):
I’ll give you one more for your question because I don’t wanna give the whole book away or the whole, it’s really not in the book. This is more of the, the, the talk that I do. But there is something else that happens when it comes to a conversation, and I wanna think about this and I wanna turn it to the time you initially have a conversation with someone the first time. Like the time you wanna meet somebody. Uh, one of the ways that I always state is that in every conversation you need to be super. Now people will say to me, Lou, what the heck are you talking about? Are we talking about flying off a building or being energized or whatever? But let, let’s make it clear too often when we meet somebody, we give the blase boring eh answer when we wanna go talk to them.

Lou (23:34):
And when someone asks me, Hey, what do you do? And you know, you, I might come out and say, Oh, I’m a sales and marketing consultant. All right? That’s wonderful. That’s very nice. That’s your job. That isn’t what you are about. Right? How much more impactful is it when you do something that kind of delivers maybe your purpose? Like I actually sometimes say, and I’ll use the superhero analogy here, I was put on this planet to work with the most amazing businesses, leaders and brands, and help them thrive through connecting a little different, a little bit better. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But I would also like to say that, you know, I love a good bourbon. I like to go ski and I like country music as well, right? These are things that are characteristics of myself that I wanna share. When you go meet somebody, a lot of times we are positioned when we’re introducing ourselves and we feel like we should be introducing ourselves a certain way.

Lou (24:24):
Like, this is my job, this is my role. And this is asking some clarification. We don’t connect with your job title, We connect with the individual and the human being that you are, we each have inside of us some superpower, some unbelievable thing that is incredible and everybody is different. And I’ll use you in his example, Rich, you’ve had over 28 years of legal experience helping people get their ideas patented and put out in the world in a way that’s going to be fit at them financially. Um, from our fame and recognition point of view for some of the ideas that they deal with, protect their rights for their business and their safety and you know, the ins and outs of all the laws and all that stuff. Cuz that’s your job. But I’ve spoken to you, I’ve had you as a guest on my show.

Lou (25:11):
I learned you’ve been an engineer and you’re, you understand the nooks and crannies of this stuff. It fascinates you and you love to see these people thrive. This is what you’re about. This is why you created this amazing podcast platform. These are the things that people wanna learn about Rich Goldstein. And this is the stuff that we should be telling everybody what you do, because those are super powers and we love to hang with super powers. If you and I had an opportunity to go to the hall of Justice and chill with Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman man, we would’ve a field day. We would wanna hang with these super people. So does everybody, everybody wants to see the superpower in everyone. And we wanna see that unleashed because in the simplest of terms, when it comes to connecting and having conversations, rich, nobody wants to connect with a dud.

Lou (25:59):
We want to connect with the superstars and the superheroes that are in all of us. So let’s let that freaking cake fly and let it out. Let you know right away, bring the energy level up when you’re connected with somebody. Elevate the energy when you’re speaking with someone. You don’t have to be a professional speaker or a podcaster like you or me when you’re doing this in a conversation, but you could get a pulse up when you’re having a conversation. It connect with someone because it takes energy to draw people into your world. And the thing that’s gonna draw them in one of those things is the super things that you bring to the table. I have dealt with some of the most impressive people on my podcast show as I sh I’m sure you have as well. These people have superpowers, they’re incredible entrepreneurs, thought leaders, comedians, business people, actors, um, people who’ve overcome unbelievable, tragic stories in their lives and shown resilience that literally are at that superhero level.

Lou (26:54):
That’s what we connect with. That’s what we all want in our lives. Why can’t we share that information in every conversation we have? Let a little bit of that superpower out because that’s what we want. You see somebody and you appreciate it. And you know, when someone walks in a room and they own who they are and they know exactly who their, their purpose is in their planet and they walk in the room, it’s like they own it. We’re drawn to that versus the person that is still trying to figure it out or is a little uncertain or is a little wishy wash, you’re a little unclear or hidden or trying to keep things to themselves. This isn’t a poker game or trying to, you know, keep your cards behind the thing. This is trying to make a connection in the effort to do that. Unleash those superpowers rich and that’s gonna draw the people into you because they wanna hang and chill with you in that hall of justice.

Rich (27:38):
Yeah, I totally relate to that. And, and I guess kind of, um, and part of it is that being too humble is inconsistent with that, right? And I think a lot of people are afraid of sounding arrogant or pretentious and they probably swing too far in the, in the wrong direction of, of just not letting their greatness shine. Yeah. And so it’s like, um, you know, it’s like they, they could probably stretch that a bit and just show their greatness and still not at all seem arrogant or pretentious or any of that. It’s just, you know, a a again, like there, there are amazing people that just are shy about letting it shine.

Lou (28:20):
Are there holding back from really stepping into owning who they are. Cuz sometimes that’s it or it’s a bad day and it, and by the way, sometimes my favorite, my favorite story had to do with, uh, a woman who I worked with for a long period of time. She was in a different, uh, location from where I was. And we, we had done some business together. This was been the last six or seven years, uh, we had both spoken at, at a conference together. We actually did a joint workshop together. And we, I really wanted to get, uh, to know her better because there was learnings that we both could have that can help each of our own businesses. And on one particular day, uh, she was off her game, something, something personal was, was taking place. And she said something to me that forever resonates.

Lou (29:05):
It was such a powerful way of saying this. And she goes, I I wanna reschedule our time load. I know we were set to have a call right now and do this. I’ve got something going on in my life that I have to deal with. I’m not gonna bring the best version of myself to this moment. And, and you deserve that and I deserve that. So can, can we reschedule this in another, another time? I said, of course. I said, Absolutely whatever the situation was. But something else happened in that moment. She unleashed one of her incredible superpowers of empathy and, and the ability to, to really be forthright, honest, one of the most honest people I’ve ever met. Think about this for a sec. This was an important conversation cuz we were navigating a pretty important deal to try and close in business with this client for a huge opportunity for both of us.

Lou (29:53):
But at that moment, she was not gonna be on our best game. How many times have we not been in our best game and probably had a conversation where we didn’t bring the best versions of ourselves? I thought it was really keen and awesome to watch when not to have a conversation because they couldn’t bring all the ways you need to be and be there for good reason cuz their energy needed to be allocated elsewhere. I will let you know that when we restarted that conversation a week later after a recharge button and the personal matters that she was dealing with were taking care of Rich, not only did we get through the things we needed to do, not only did I feel closer to her, but what do you think? I started that conversation with gratitude, Well, gratitude and a check in to be showing my sense of empathy to her saying, mm-hmm <affirmative> is everything okay from last week? You know, I didn’t want to dive down, whatever it was. And the sense of appreciation, gratitude that she had of me just asking and her then being appreciative that I gave her that time to reset.

Rich (30:55):
Right.

Lou (30:57):
Actually got the stuff that we got done so much faster than we ever could have in that other situation without any questions, issues, or matters. So as I say to your listeners, that part of the, our personality, our charisma that comes out, that’s part of the ness that we are. Uh, it also bleeds into making sure that you’re authentic to who you are. A very important way to make sure your conversations are real. Um, and in the speakeasy way of doing things. It’s a very simple way to know that. Be at your best in that conversation and you’ll have more of them with who you want to talk to.

Rich (31:30):
Oh, that’s awesome. And, and the, the book speakeasy is, um, out at the end of September.

Lou (31:36):
Yes, correct. It’s, it’s out, it’s, it just came out. Uh, it’s, uh, off the shelves. It’s in stores. Wherever you find your books, wherever you get them, you could find it or you can go to speak easy book.com, uh, to to check it out over there.

Rich (31:50):
Awesome. And uh, and the podcast is amazing. You are amazing at distinguishing how connections happen and that translates to fantastic interviews. The podcast Thrive Loud, really fantastic. Uh, podcast is one of my new favorites now that I just learned about it from our learned about it and learned about you from our common friend, uh, Heather Pierce Campbell,

Lou (32:13):
Who was on your show. She was great.

Rich (32:14):
She was on my show. Exactly. Um, and so just highly recommend your podcast, uh, to everyone. And if people wanna learn more about you or again, touch with you, how do they go about doing so

Lou (32:25):
Anywhere on social media at Thrive Loud is where you can find me or thrive loud.com. That’s THRIVELOUDforLouD.com.

Rich (32:37):
Lou, this was amazing. Thanks so much for taking the time, um, to be here and really grateful to get to know you. Absolutely. Thanks for having me, Rich.

Outro (32:50):
Thanks for listening to Innovations and Breakthroughs with your host Rich Goldstein. Be sure to click subscribe, check us out on the web innovationsandbreakthroughs.com and we’ll see you next time.