EPI 73: That Extra $55,000 Sure Did Help
EPI 73: That Extra $55,000 Sure Did Help
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I Made It Rain!
For the past 3 months, I’ve been in a construction-based whirlwind with my mom’s house.
We began with an expensive rebuild of her bathroom and bay window. She paid for all that.
And more than one time, as adjustments became necessary.
In the process, we discovered the roof needed to be replaced.
Ma could not afford that and neither could I.
Also, hearing the first contractor’s quote almost killed her! No exaggeration.
I had to get her calmed down, then I explained I’d find a solution.
My first thought was to get government help for the widow of a retired Army soldier.
This led to me making the first phone call to a local veterans agency.
It turned out to be the ONLY one as the rest of this story unfolded!
I knew before I made the call that this wasn’t a thing. But I figured they at least know where I might turn next.
I was dead nuts correct on that assumption!
The agency had nothing formally. But they had an informal email list of local businesses and citizens who supported veterans and their families in times of need,
I covered all this in earlier posts.
The thing I wanted to focus on in this post was the fact of that I was able to create $55,000 in a little over over 2 months, just going with my gut.
Ma’s roof got done in one day, earlier this week.
All other major systems have been replaced or are about to be.
We were quietly sitting around, celebrating the completion of the roof, when Ma asked me, “How much WERE you able to come up with?”
I had to go through emails, finding proposals for everything and adding to that list the things not covered via official routes.
The total was a little over $55,000 give or take.
In 2 months!
Although I was familiar with all the pieces that came to light, I’d never managed or directed a project of this sort in its entirety before.
And yet, I did it. And I did it well!
This realization gave me confidence in an area that was new to me. And it made clear to me that more and more abundance is headed my way.
It doesn’t matter that this money came from something other than sales of my products or services.
What matters is that IT CAME!
I set my intention, which was to make sure my mom ‘s needs were covered, no matter what it might take.
And then I saw it all through.
Uncovering more of my own capabilities, in new areas especially, is a sport of mine that I can never stop pursuing.
It’s an area of mastery that I feel compelled to evolve in, until the day I’m dead.
Transcript
Just click the “READ MORE” text below for the transcript!
Hey, this is Ken Jensen. I beat bipolar disorder in an all natural fashion back in the mid 2 thousands. And believe it or not, that’s not even the coolest part of my story.
What I learned through that process and what came next and how that applied to bipolar and why bipolar was ever even part of the process, was mind blowing to say the least.
Bipolar has hidden within its strengths. I’m gonna show you what I mean and how they’ve show up in my life so you can do the same.
Welcome to episode 73. That extra 55000 dollars shirt did help. Something happened, I’m sure I must have talked about it on the last handful of episodes, but My’s house needed a lot of work. Dad being a 20 year army veteran and retired.
He was in the army army reserves, and myself being a marine war vet, I decided to look into finding some potential government funding for my mom as a widow of and the mother of to see if something existed to help fund the the many repairs to basically all the major systems in her house.
I knew ahead of time that there wasn’t gonna be any such program because as a vet, I ripped those things apart. Looking for help for myself for any number of reasons over the decades. I knew I knew such a thing did not exist.
So I did the only thing that made sense to me that I called a local agency the Olster County Veterans Services Agency, I believe it’s called, And my thinking was they’re either gonna have what I need available through the government, which I knew it didn’t.
Or they might know something. They might they might know who I could call next. Well, it turned out they knew something.
They maintained a private list of local business owners and then some who support veterans. Veterans in need. And my mom qualified. The lady at that agency told me she’s like, look, this is completely voluntary.
There’s nothing guaranteed. I put the word out to the list. We see if they respond. Nobody might respond. She’s like, there’s no talent, so don’t, you know, just wait and see.
The response was immediate and massive. I don’t feel like going through that entire story. I guess I sort of should should be because of the title of the show, but there’s other things I wanna share.
And I’m pretty sure I talked about this earlier, but some local business businessman stepped up right away, donated money, 1 1 guy led me directly to the guy who’s company would end up rebuilding my mom’s entire roof.
So that was Bob Ryan from Ryan and Ryan in earn to Kingston, he led the charge.
I worked with him closely on a lot of this to stay in touch with the network. Then there was Ian over at J and A Roofing who was on that list and he wanted to donate what he could as as a roof roof builder to the to the project.
He he gave us a really great discount. And in the end, he even chipped in himself to his own his own project.
I was I never even knew that was a thing you could do. The roof got done the other day. They did it in 1 day, This thing would fix in my mom’s house has been going on for months, and it is fatiguing us.
There’s been there was a project that started initially with a repair to her bathroom that turned into a it’s just sort of a simmering ongoing disaster for a number of reasons I won’t get into.
But that led to the greater issues being discovered that then led to what I’m talking about on right now. So it was kind of a a good thing disguised as a bad thing. But overall, we we came out far ahead.
I ended up on local radio once I was fielding a lot of phone calls from a lot of people all needing to know what the other person was saying, what the other agency was saying, what a company was up to.
Did the permits get secured? Who’s gonna take care of this? Who’s gonna take care of that? A lot of times, I couldn’t answer anybody because it was like a 22. They both needed to do something before I could tell the other 1 what to do.
A charity came on board building homes for heroes. They came on board. They ended up funding the roof. They ended up funding the whole house generator. We lose power in this area a lot.
Mod’s got health issues, which can’t be without power. I’m not going to live as close by as I do now. For much longer. So I need to know that she’s as set as possible, at least till I got time to come and and help her.
So I I wanted all these things handled, and this charity handled the biggest ones. Her whole house, Central Air is getting her she had a old unit.
If it was getting sick, it’s been getting sick for years, it finally crapped out in the latest heatwave we had in upstate, New York. The charity had not given anymore. They they they were like, we’ve given what we’ve given.
You’re welcome. I was fine with that. But I figured what the hell can’t hurt but ask because this has been part of my wish list and they did not sign off on it initially and that’s fine.
They can’t they and do whatever they want, we’re nothing but grateful, and it still are. But I figured what the hell. Let me ask 1 more time.
And I did and they answered within a day, send a proposal for the AC, which they initially did not sign off on. Just the best people. So Got that all figured out. And that that’s in the middle of that’ll be happening soon.
That’ll get replaced. It’s an old unit, so the whole unit has to come out because the refrigerant is the old the old horrific kind that does not match the new kind that doesn’t hurt mother earth. And you can’t mix the pipes for that.
Chemicals are created inside the pipes and the 1 since the new system will clash with the old and what happens is, gets a little corrosive in there and it’ll eat up the new system fast, the new compressor.
So that got handled. There’s a bunch of other things, my dad’s army group, his era from the 850 fourth engineers based out of Kingston, New York, his era of guys wanted to help.
And they volunteer time, and they have connections to the local lows. And, you know, we we get discounts out the ass being everybody’s a veteran, things like that. Somebody knows somebody who knows somebody.
They’re handling everything that remains that the charity would not, or could not, sign off on. There’s more things But I’m already, like, getting a you know, I’m I’m weary from talking about be quite honest with you.
It’s been it’s been a lot of work. III started to go fund me page. That eventually raised counting all the donations that came in, the go fund me ended up raising 13 grand and change.
I was looking for 17 grand. About half the things that came in on Gofundme came in directly through GoFund Me. The rest, because I just added all the all the cash donations.
I just put them all together so people would see who was doing what. So anybody that gave a cash donation, I added them to the gofundme list because it’s just whatever close enough.
And I wanted to publicly honor everyone that wanted to be honored, so that everybody knew, you know, who you know, who was who was helping Ma and and lot of these people didn’t want any recognition.
And that was cool too. Now, to tie this back to by polar excellence and my mission. Did I Let me let me say this. I was in charge of this entire project and something of this sort, I’ve never managed before.
I was learning it as I went, but nothing. No sink no single part was new to me. I’ve just never dealt with them being woven together like they were in a project like this.
I had a lot of questions it was really stressful because I’m doing all the rest of my life as well, plus we’re still dealing with the initial project at the house that’s just going on and on on.
There’s just all these stresses, and I’m I was hyper focused on making sure I didn’t fuck up and trip over my own feet in the doing of this all.
And I almost did a few different times. And sometimes, it would have been in in spectacular fashion. Knowing what I know about everybody involved now, nothing was unfixable.
I I could have rescued any terrible mistake I made. And the mistake being it would it would have been like awkward on a personal level, some of the moves I wanted to make, only because I only had partial information at times.
In a decision had to be made, clocks were ticking. And then some things didn’t go the way I wanted them to, And then later, they went a better way.
And I almost I almost shorted that part of the story out at least 1 time in a really bad sense. Again, it would have been fixable, but I’d had egg on my face and felt like a dick.
I just soon avoid that. Now the coolest thing that came out of this for me besides helping my in securing her her health and safety really going into the next 10:15, 20 years as far as the house was concerned.
I generated 55000 dollars in just in goods and services and donations in just over 2 months.
I was at the heart of all of that, orchestrating it, directing it, managing it, fulfilling on whatever parts needed my attention. I didn’t sell any stuff on my web I or get hired to do anything and put that cash in my pocket.
But I caused 55000 dollars to fall out of the clear blue sky. The reason I share this is There’s a saying that it’s not in front of me right now, so I’m gonna just paraphrase it and be be short.
As soon as you decide to do something, as soon as you create an intention, the universe starts moving things around in your favor.
Opportunities arise that would not have arisen, had you not put some skin in the game in the form of effort? Had you not set the intention that this is what’s gonna happen, come hell or high water?
I’m always telling people for Well, really, always, if you want something to improve in your life, you’ve gotta put some skin in the game. There are ways of getting things for free.
There are ways for doing things for free. But there If that’s all you do, your project’s never gonna come to life. Your business is never gonna get off the ground. Whatever your big goal is, it’s not gonna succeed.
You can’t you can’t exist in in a it’s a needy kind of energy. You you can experience it sporadic. People give away a lot of stuff. I give away stuff on my site to entice people to sign up, and and it’s good stuff.
And there’s nothing wrong with that, but if that’s how you base all your learning and growth, all your content consumption is is constantly looking for the free stuff.
That’s what you’re gonna get in return from the universe. You’re gonna get you’re gonna get some kind of free stuff back to you without the growth. You’ve gotta be willing to fight for whatever it is you believe in.
In this case for me, it was my mom. I had no 0 fucking idea that this was gonna turn into this. I I had the only I I had the intention. I’m helping mine no matter what, the end. I don’t know what I gotta do.
I had an idea, of course, like I said. And I had other ideas. I just needed to start with 1 and then what else I might draw from as the thing played out. But I had no idea it was gonna turn into all of that nor happen as fast as it did.
Nor grow as big as it did, but I learned a long time ago in the doing of all of this When you make a move like that, these things can happen, they’re gonna look different depending on what it is, your goal is and what you’re trying to achieve.
But things do happen. I was amazed I was amazed at this entire process and what I was able to do.
None of this was rocket science and whatnot, but like I said, It was very confusing at times, very frustrating at times, very unclear at times. A lot of back and forth emails which got shit got lost in the multiple threads.
I’d lose my place sometimes. You know, other people would be waiting on me and need something to happen faster, and they are pressing me, all understandable.
I’m just saying, I was in the middle of a whirlwind and I handled it. My life is built up of situations like this. It it makes me directly think of great story.
There’s no time to tell at all, but I I had a very a very brutal 4 hour repair job with another guy, another veteran, in a heatwave on a Saturday when I was working out west, physically brutal job and super uncomfortable conditions that damn near killed us.
When we were done, this guy and myself were always we hated our jobs and we always were talking about ways of making money.
I’m going back like, I don’t know. Like 25 More than 25 years now. And we my phone’s flashing for some reason on as I record this for YouTube, and it broke my concentration. There’s not pause. I don’t know what a foot it flashed for.
But anyway, we kicked around a bunch of ideas, James and I, and somehow, and it took weeks. Somehow, we eventually realized that there were a lot of health and wellness type shows happening all up and down the Rockies in our area.
We were in Denver, loads of them, hundreds of them, and and and we’d like that stuff. And the more we dug into it, we realized it’s on both sides of the Rockies, up and down the length of them.
This was a very hot industry with apparent room for for for more players. Because we’re so damn many of them. We ended up building across the next 9 months from nothing.
And and then, hey, I should I should make clear. Once again, I had 1 connection in my family tree who did such things for a living professionally. She put on 3 or 4 major shows in the millions of dollars we’re talking.
In the many many millions of dollars, she would put the show itself together. She was like a showrunner you you could call inside of big places big venues like the the the Java Center and Madison SquareARD and what have you.
Have like 3 or 4 major companies come in and and and shop their wares, sell their wares to whoever visited, and have a whole conference going on around it.
That kind of a thing. I just happen to have that. I was like, well, let me give her a call.
I called Mary and she directed us through what what turned out to be a very a very brutal it was hard. What we went through to build that show, which was See, I paused again, goddamn it because I’m looking at my phone.
It’s freezing, which was called the Ascension celebration. It was a metaphysical and holistic health fair. It went 3 days long. We made over 10000 dollars on our very first show, and we knew nothing about any of us when we started.
This is what I do. This is what I do for myself many times over. It’s and so this is what I talk about now. This is what I like doing. I wanna do it with more people for more reasons.
Now, the phone had me freaked out because there’s an app on my phone called Focos live and it lets me record videos and it it I I can I can edit the video, the colors, and or I could do all kinds of shit?
Really, all I do is warm up the colors, and it does a blurry background, which is called bokeh.
Well, that thing lost its mind and stopped working the other day. It was not you have to record right into it, and it was not recording sound right.
The sound quality was all broken and choppy and in and out. I did everything I could think of to to fix it, which wasn’t a whole lot of things, but nothing fixed it.
And then I I lost a whole day and part of the next day researching alternate options to replace this focus and it just what a time suck it was, drain my energy. I got all these videos I gotta make for my website as well.
Plus the ones I’m making now to go on YouTube. And the funny thing was after sampling a whole bunch of different softwares and apps and learning them to to whatever degree. And studying YouTube videos on how to do them.
At 1 point, following my gut and just frustrated, I was like fuck it. Let’s see if this thing works again. I reloaded it and tried it and it worked fine. It worked fucking fine. I don’t know why it wouldn’t work the day before.
I’ve made like a hundred and 50 freaking videos with this app. I have no idea what happened. Now today, now that I’m I’m slowly working my way into putting these these live well, actual videos of me doing a podcast on YouTube.
Now I’m gun shy. Now my face is tingly and hot and my my gut is tight and and cold. As my phone does things, I don’t understand what it’s doing because I’ve never used this app in this fashion.
So hopefully, this came out I already have 1 1 video in the chamber from last week and then this 1 will be next up. And I’ll have them on on YouTube in place of the mostly static things that are on YouTube right now.
You can actually see me doing these podcasts. So there was all of that happened, and then something else happened that made me make a few changes and how I’m running my life in relation to this growing business.
I learned some rather painful lessons last week with a podcast guest, but I know why everything happened like it did. And I don’t wanna say anything more because I’m I’m gonna experiment with a bit of a cliffhanger for you.
Probably next week, I’m assuming I’ll I’ll I’ll I’ll say more on that because right now I just wanted to celebrate this straight win with the house and my mom.
So the painful lessons episodes coming up next, you’re gonna wanna hear that. If you’re running a if you’re running a podcast or anything that interviews guests, And there’s some marketing lessons I learned on a few different levels.
There’s things to know about intention and planning and research I think it’s gonna be I know it’s gonna be very powerful if this stuff’s all new to you.
So stay tuned for that. And on that note, I wish you guys well. I now have an urge to have some kind of catch line other than, you know, an ending thing other than be well.
And nothing’s coming to me for the moment, but I’m gonna make a note and see if I can figure something out with intention. In my spare time, my free time. Alright, guys. Having said that, be well!
