How to Maximize Personal and Professional Growth With Jim Cathcart

Jim Cathcart: Earl said on that day in 1972, if you will spend one extra hour every day studying your chosen field in five years or less, you'll be a national expert in that field. Harry, that hit me like an oncoming train 

[00:00:20] Welcome to Sales Made Easy, a podcast for business and personal growth. Join Harry Spaight, as he hosts sales experts and business owners who share their journeys of personal growth and business success now, here's your host, Harry. ​Becoming a professional expert. Have you given that much thought lately? Well, I am sure you will today after you listen to my guest, Jim Cathcart, who is a certified professional [00:01:00] speaker. He is an author who has done it all. He has delivered, just get this, over 3, 500 convention speeches. He's written 26 books.

[00:01:12] Harry: He's traveled around the world. He's a musician, loves to sing about stuff that us baby boomers love from the days of Elvis to the Beatles. He is a university MBA professor. He's a top 1 percent TEDx speaker. He's known in China. I mean, come on. And he is a guest on the Sales Made Easy podcast. Jim Cathcart, welcome to the show.

[00:01:38] Harry: The crowd goes wild. There you go. 

[00:01:40] Jim Cathcart: I have finally arrived, Bayali. Bayali. 

[00:01:43] Harry: Forget all those other, all that other recognition. You're on sales made easy. Does it get any better? 

[00:01:51] Jim Cathcart: I can't imagine how. 

[00:01:54] Harry: Oh, so good. You and I were just chatting. I'm so grateful for a friend. I'll give a shout out. [00:02:00] Ron Frost, mentioned you recently.

[00:02:03] Harry: And I said, I've got to get on the podcast. So you're so gracious with that LinkedIn intro to say yes to this stranger. And I'm super honored that you're here. So talk to me, you I was watching your TEDx talk and you mentioned something about hearing a voice. In another room that happened to be the voice of Earl Nightingale of all people.

[00:02:33] Harry: So how did that change your life? 

[00:02:36] Jim Cathcart: 1972 Little Rock, Arkansas. I was what? 26 years old. And, I was a clerk. at the housing authority, making 525 a month struggling. Obviously you know, I'm a kid newly married with a baby at home and my wife's making 400 a month as a [00:03:00] secretary. Actually is a Kelly girl, which was a temp agency, right?

[00:03:06] Jim Cathcart: And and I was making 5 25 and we were just squeaking by and I had no college degree. I'd never been an athlete or an academic scholar or anything like that. I didn't know anybody with money. My dad was a telephone repairman. Mom was a homemaker. We had never been around people who were successful. And so I had no concept of what it meant.

[00:03:29] Jim Cathcart: what it was like to be a achiever in the world. And, I was sitting there wondering what I was going to do when I grew up. You know, what do I want to do for a living? Cause I was assistant to a guy who wasn't busy. Guy named Bob Moore. He had like seven hours a day, free time, and I was his helper. So I'm sitting there with eight hours a day of free time, and I'm thinking, what do I want to do when I grow up?

[00:03:59] Jim Cathcart: And I hear [00:04:00] this voice in the next room on the radio, and it's as you mentioned, Earl Nightingale, the Dean of Personal Motivation, who was on 900 stations all over the world at that time. This was way, way before the Tony Robbins and folks like that came around. Even Zig Ziglar was unknown at that time.

[00:04:20] Jim Cathcart: And, Earl said on that day in 1972, if you will spend one extra hour every day studying your chosen field in five years or less, you'll be a national expert in that field. Harry, that hit me like an oncoming train. I said, wait a minute. That's actually true. An hour a day, five days a week, 50 weeks a year, five years.

[00:04:46] Jim Cathcart: That's 1250 hours on one subject. Yeah. I mean, even I could become an expert on a subject doing that. If the subject was narrow enough, if I was studying something like [00:05:00] management. No, I would just be knowledgeable about management, but managing teams in crisis situations and in the tropics. Okay, 1, 250 hours on that.

[00:05:13] Jim Cathcart: You bet. I'd be the world's leading authority on it in five years, right? So I'm thinking, okay, you know, what, what do I want to be an expert at? Well, there's not urban renewal. I don't know. And I kept thinking, and finally a couple of weeks later, I guess it hit me. I want to do what he does. You know, I want to be like Harry.

[00:05:34] Jim Cathcart: I want, I want to be the guy on the radio. And, and then I thought, I don't know what that means. I don't, I have no clue what that's like. But Earl Nightingale inspired me and I wanted to be like Earl Nightingale. So I decided I'll take him at his word and I'll become a fanatical emphasis on that word student.

[00:05:55] Jim Cathcart: Of human development and I I did. I [00:06:00] started spending an hour every day, sometimes two hours on weekends, 345 hours studying anything I could get my hands on on human development. I got all the classic books think and grow rich. How to win friends and influence people. Power of positive thinking as a man thinketh.

[00:06:20] Jim Cathcart: The science of getting rich, you know, all the famous books that we've come to know in recent years. I got all those books and read them cover to cover. In some cases, re read them. I got a recording of The Strangest Secret on a big old disc record of Earl Nightingale. Listened to it again and again.

[00:06:38] Jim Cathcart: Bought Earl Nightingale's audio cassettes. Remember, this was 1970s. And I'll show you. 

[00:06:48] Harry: All right, so we're talking cassettes, not 8 tracks. 

[00:06:53] Jim Cathcart: Yeah. Cassettes, . 

[00:06:55] Harry: All right. There they are. 

[00:06:56] Jim Cathcart: And this is one of the cassette packs of the Earl [00:07:00] Nightingale library of 36. Such so cool cassette packs. 

[00:07:05] Harry: Yeah. 

[00:07:06] Jim Cathcart: That I bought for $560.

[00:07:10] Jim Cathcart: Wow. Today that'd be like $3,500 adjusted. That's like 

[00:07:14] Harry: a month's pay for you. Back then you were making, it was a more than a month's pay. Right. That was 

[00:07:19] Jim Cathcart: a scary, scary expenditure to my, my wife. Because she, she said, Jim, we can't afford this. I said, I know, but I got the whole library of cassettes on loan for a month.

[00:07:32] Jim Cathcart: So I'm going to listen and learn everything that's in it and then give it back. And, and, and so the guy who had loaned it to me on, on preview, he said, listen to it for a month. And then at the end of the month, if you want to keep it, figure out how to pay for it. If not, give it back. So I'm every day and I'm, you know, I'm listening to those cassettes and I'm listening when I'm grilling hamburgers on the grill, I'm listening while I'm washing the car, I'm [00:08:00] listening everywhere I go and anything I do, I've got that cassette player, little portable thing with batteries that I was playing until the batteries would run out about once every two weeks and I'd have to replace them and listen again and listen again.

[00:08:15] Jim Cathcart: And I became a different person. When I say fanatical, I'm talking severely fanatical and like the textbook clinical, this guy needs treatment version of fanatical and, my life started changing. I mean, I, I was not only getting inspired, I was learning. So I learned how to set goals. I learned how to organize my time.

[00:08:39] Jim Cathcart: I learned how to set priorities, how to get along better with people that weren't like me or disagreed with me, how to make sales, how to. how to develop a plan, how to inspire people, how to motivate myself, you know, all these things in my every day, you know, my mind is just stretching to embrace all this [00:09:00] new information and it starts showing up on the job.

[00:09:04] Jim Cathcart: So I got a promotion. They moved me from the field office where I was board to the main office of the housing authority and made me the assistant to the board of directors. Whoa. And then my fellow employees elected me president of the employees association. I said, what, when, when was the election?

[00:09:25] Jim Cathcart: They said yesterday. And I said, I didn't know there was a meeting. I didn't even know there was an association. They said, Yeah, we know. Ha ha ha. You're the president. They thought it was a joke. And I said, Well, okay, what do presidents do? And so I started taking it seriously. And I went and met with the executive director.

[00:09:47] Jim Cathcart: And I said, I'm the new president of the Employees Association. Here's what the people say they're interested in. What do you need them to know from you? And that got me another raise and a bonus. [00:10:00] And then I left the housing authority and I became a full time salesperson selling Earl Nightingale's cassettes door to door in Little Rock, Arkansas.

[00:10:12] Jim Cathcart: Now, this was 1974, started in 72, two years later, by 74, I'm selling Earl Nightingale's tapes door to door and to businesses. And I joined the Junior Chamber of Commerce, the JCs. And I joined in order to form a chapter in my neighborhood. The purpose of JCs was leadership training. And the way they did it was by doing projects, charitable projects in the community.

[00:10:41] Jim Cathcart: I went to 400 JCs meetings in two years. After work and on weekends and holidays for free. 400 in two years. So let's revisit the earlier word fanatic. Okay. But here's what happened. My [00:11:00] life went from like this to like this 

[00:11:03] Harry: rocket ship 

[00:11:05] Jim Cathcart: and yeah, and my whole world transformed the friends that hung out with me before said, you know, that's a little much.

[00:11:13] Jim Cathcart: And so they kind of drifted away and new friends came around and we all collaborated and helped each other grow. And by 1976,

[00:11:23] Jim Cathcart: I was full time selling all there. No, 75. I was selling these 9 Gil programs and I got a call from the headquarters of the junior camera of commerce in Tulsa, Oklahoma. And at that time, the JC has had 356, 000 members. Thank you very much. It was the peak of the baby boom, and that was their market. And they had a hundred employees in Tulsa at their national headquarters, and they hired me to be senior program manager in charge of leadership training for all 350, 000 members.

[00:11:59] Jim Cathcart: Now, think of [00:12:00] this. I heard Earl on the radio in 72. I started selling his recordings in 74. I got a position as national expert in charge of leadership training in 1975. And in 1977, I went off into business for myself and never looked back. That's all I've done since 1974. 

[00:12:26] Harry: Incredible. Did you have, so two questions come to mind.

[00:12:30] Harry: Number one is what was like the first thing that you recognized through the reading of this motivation and self help, if we could call it that, what was the first thing you recognized about yourself? And then the second thing is, how did, did you have to deal with any self doubt when you got into that type of role?

[00:12:56] Jim Cathcart: Yep. Well, the first thing I learned was from Earl [00:13:00] Nightingale. He made it very clear to me that if you want to succeed. You need to become the kind of person who would. I was not. I had never aspired to bigger things. I had been an average student in school. I hadn't aced an IQ test or SAT or anything indicating high intellect.

[00:13:24] Jim Cathcart: Was not known as an achiever. I was just a good guy and I figured I'd have an ordinary life and die at the statistical age of my gene pool. Right? So I figured I'll get a middle management job somewhere and retire at 65 and die at whatever. And then I heard the recording and then I started really, really studying, immersing myself in that, that learning.

[00:13:55] Jim Cathcart: And what I got, the impression I got was, Jim, if you will acquire [00:14:00] the qualities. Of a person who would be considered an expert and his advice sought after, then the rest of the things you want, as they say, in the Bible will be added unto you, you know, seek you first. They have the kingdom and all the rest will be added unto you.

[00:14:19] Jim Cathcart: Well, that's kind of the principle here. If you decide, okay, I want to be 1 of the leading, I don't know, engineers in the world. Well, let's study leading engineers and find out what are they like? That's different from all the other engineers because there are millions of engine. Well, many, many thousands of engineers in the world.

[00:14:43] Jim Cathcart: Right? What about the leading ones? What makes them different? So I wanted to be an expert in human development, but I didn't know anything. And I used to joke. I wanted to be a professional speaker, but I'd never given a speech. Okay. And I had nothing to [00:15:00] say, you know, that'll keep your fees low. So I, the first thing I had to do was figure out what qualities do I need?

[00:15:10] Jim Cathcart: Well, I need to cultivate. Optimism, you know, if people say, I'm not an optimist, I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist, which is a pessimist that lies about it. The optimism is just a worldview that says somewhere, somehow, under some circumstances. Almost anything's possible. Pessimist worldview is look at all the limitations in the world.

[00:15:37] Jim Cathcart: They're probably permanent. Why not myself out? I'm going to give up. And the one that says I'm a realist says the pessimist is right, and I can prove it. You know, so I decided to cultivate an optimistic worldview. And I did that through listening to the recordings and reading all these things and hanging around people with a more healthier [00:16:00] expansive worldview.

[00:16:02] Jim Cathcart: Second thing. I need to get control of my own life. So I quit smoking after 13 years, quit cold, gave away my engraved lighters to strangers so I wouldn't get them back, told my whole world, we're out of the smoking business at my house. We don't have ashtrays. I'll stand outside with you while you smoke, but we're not going to do the indoor thing anymore.

[00:16:26] Jim Cathcart: And some of my friends said, well, this was 1974. They said, well, if I can't smoke at your house, then I'm not coming over. Understood your cigarettes more important than I am to you. So see ya. And so I, I, it took me three months to withdraw, but I did, and I never smoked since, and I never will. Then I had to get in shape.

[00:16:48] Jim Cathcart: I lost 52 pounds of fat and became a jogger and exercised. And wow, that changed my world. And then I, I [00:17:00] just, everything I did, I was learning better how to communicate. How to, how to be angry and not mess up all my relationships because I'm angry, how to be happy and spread the joy tactfully and appropriately, you know, instead of looking silly.

[00:17:17] Jim Cathcart: I learned all kinds of things, listening skills. stress management skills, how to organize a meeting, how to run a meeting, how to lead and motivate other people when you didn't have money to dangle in front of them, how to get myself to do what needs to be done when I don't feel like it yet and still do a good job of it, how to be responsible, how to, how to build a reputation as being a true professional.

[00:17:45] Jim Cathcart: And as I did all those things, Everything I dreamed of started coming true. And Harry, as you said, I've been all over the world. I did 20, 20 lecture tours of [00:18:00] mainland China, 25 major cities speaking to tens of thousands of hundreds of thousands of Chinese business people for six hours a day through an interpreter.

[00:18:11] Jim Cathcart: And the most recent of those was in January of this year. I've written in a world. 

[00:18:17] Harry: Did you get into that country and start doing that? It's got to be. Yeah. Tell them what's the story. This 

[00:18:23] Jim Cathcart: is very, this is proof of my concept. I've done all these things to become the kind of person that I dreamed of being.

[00:18:32] Jim Cathcart: I had gotten nominated to be on the board of directors of the National Speakers Association, which is about three or four thousand professional speakers and authors. I rose through the ranks and became the president of that group. Then I received all the awards they give, the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame, the Certified Speaking Professional designation, the Cavett Award, which is the name for the founder of the group, which is that statue over there in the [00:19:00] corner with my cowboy hat above it.

[00:19:02] Jim Cathcart: The Toastmasters International called me and I wouldn't even a member and they gave me their golden gavel award, which they had previously given to Earl Nightingale, Walter Cronkite, Zig Ziglar. I mean, I've 

[00:19:17] Harry: heard of those people. 

[00:19:19] Jim Cathcart: And so Jim Cathcart. Yeah, 

[00:19:22] Harry: but him on top. 

[00:19:24] Jim Cathcart: That was it was amazing. So all of this happened.

[00:19:28] Jim Cathcart: And then in 2014 or 2015, I was at the Speakers Convention in San Diego and a colleague of mine came up Roger Dawson. He had with him a Chinese man, Dr. David Chu, and he introduced us and Dr. Chu said, Jim, I've been following you for about five years. He said, I run a boutique speakers bureau in China called world's masters.

[00:19:56] Jim Cathcart: And I have Mark Victor Hanson, coauthor of chicken soup for the soul with [00:20:00] Jack Canfield. I have Tom Hopkins, sales trainer. I have J Abraham, marketing strategist. I have Roger Dawson, negotiations, John Gray, men are from Mars. Women's from Venus. I have Bob Proctor. And he said, and I have an opening for you.

[00:20:22] Jim Cathcart: I said, no, I don't know if he said, and I have Brian Tracy. I said, I don't think I fit into that group. He said, oh, you definitely fit in that group. He said, I'm going to position you as the world's leading speaking trainer. And I said, what is a speaking trainer? He said, I don't know, but you're one of the best speakers I've ever seen.

[00:20:44] Jim Cathcart: He said, it was going to be when I, when I realized I had one opening, I was either going to ask Zig Ziglar or you, and Zig has gotten old enough that he doesn't want to travel internationally anymore. So it's you. I said, [00:21:00] holy smokes. I said, well, if you believe that much in me, then I'm in. And so now I've done 20 tours over there and, you know, all those major cities and everything.

[00:21:10] Jim Cathcart: And I've got four books in Chinese. You know, I, Wow. When I think of the things I've done, you know, I've, I've been in the White House and alone with the President of the United States in the Oval Office. I've been, I've spoken at the United Nations. I've been on stage at the Grand Ole Opry during a show.

[00:21:31] Jim Cathcart: I've, I've, I mean, it just goes on and on. 

[00:21:34] Harry: Wow. And you were a government worker. I was a clerk. 

[00:21:40] Jim Cathcart: I wasn't even a worker. I was an assistant to a worker. 

[00:21:44] Harry: And you listened to Earl Nightingale and Look Out World. Yeah. Now 

[00:21:50] Jim Cathcart: here's, here's a big question. It's, you know, so people say, well, Jim, I'm thinking about bringing you in as an advisor for our company or [00:22:00] hiring you as my mentor, you know, retaining you to be my mentor and help me grow my career.

[00:22:06] Jim Cathcart: Or I'm thinking about you as the keynote speaker for our big, important annual meeting. The first question they ought to be asking themselves Is who is this guy really? I mean, he might have something good to say, but anybody could do that. I could give someone a book, say, memorize this and deliver it beautifully.

[00:22:26] Jim Cathcart: So I could hire an actor. But who is this guy really? Is he what he says he is? Well, by their fruits, you shall know them, right? 

[00:22:35] Harry: Yeah. 

[00:22:36] Jim Cathcart: So you want to know who somebody is check their track record. How long were they in prison for me? That'd be not at all, except as a trainer teaching inmates and during the J.

[00:22:50] Jim Cathcart: C. S. days, and I don't care to repeat that experience. That was scary enough. Just being a guest. But also, you know, you [00:23:00] look at their reputation online. What are their peers? What are their former clients? What are their colleagues, their neighbors, their friends, the fellow church members, the members of their social group, what do those people think of them and how long has their reputation been good and thankfully I've been very intentional about being the person that deserves the reputation.

[00:23:24] Jim Cathcart: I want. And then how did their kids turn out? Well, my son is the person I want to grow up to be. He's been an executive with Four Seasons Hotels for 26 years. He's the resort manager for Four Seasons Santa Barbara, the Four Seasons Biltmore, which is being rebuilt and renovated. But 26 years with four seasons and he's got two kids in their twenties and they turned out well.

[00:23:56] Jim Cathcart: Yeah. So that tells me that I got the right [00:24:00] message early on and practiced it in the right ways. But I'm still, you know, I'm not, I'm still a jerk sometimes, just not as much. So as I used to be, 

[00:24:11] Harry: well, it's so funny. I mean, what you just said, right? I love, I love the self deprecation, but the When you think back in 1972 You're way overweight.

[00:24:25] Harry: I mean you lost whatever like a quarter of your weight 

[00:24:29] Jim Cathcart: Yeah, I did 

[00:24:30] Harry: neighborhood, right? Yeah, two packs a day smoker, right? So You could have been long ago Deceased 

[00:24:42] Jim Cathcart: that's a good point, 

[00:24:43] Harry: right? I mean, that's a very good 

[00:24:45] Jim Cathcart: point. 

[00:24:45] Harry: Yeah, because living that trajectory I mean your weight probably would have gone up prone for a heart attack.

[00:24:52] Harry: You might not even be 50 and missed out on all the things that your son and your [00:25:00] grandchildren are doing. So that's one aspect. So just, just the idea, it's just, it's hard to comprehend is how many lives got impacted by your changing. Your outlook on life, right? 

[00:25:19] Jim Cathcart: 26 books and 3500 convention speeches.

[00:25:23] Jim Cathcart: There's no telling. Yeah, I mean, the echo effect of my transformation has been profound. Happily, I have not done all of this To aggrandize me, but rather to further the message and to reach more people. And that's allowed me to get the benefits that I would have been seeking if I'd been selfish. 

[00:25:46] Harry: Well, you know, one of the things that you talked about in your TEDx talk is like, you all, you, we believe, you believe that we're all here for a purpose.

[00:25:55] Jim Cathcart: Right. 

[00:25:56] Harry: Living a life of purpose. And I think this is a real [00:26:00] challenge for people is that they try to figure out. What this is, 

[00:26:04] Jim Cathcart: you 

[00:26:06] Harry: know, the fact that you, you didn't really know what your purpose was. Now you listen to something on the radio and then you go all in. Is it just because you went all in on something that that's what your purpose was or?

[00:26:21] Jim Cathcart: No, I don't think so. I did it like a friend of mine. Colleague John Lynn told me the other day we had had like a 6 hour conversation the day before and he said, man, you were born for this. I said, really, what do you mean by that? He said, it just seems that your essence, I'm paraphrasing, but the nature of you is so ideally suited to the path you have chosen.

[00:26:52] Jim Cathcart: And I said, you know, but the earlier version of me wasn't this was, I discovered this. And I [00:27:00] realized I just found my, my life's direction, my destiny, so to speak. But remember when I found it, I wasn't qualified to receive it. So I had to become an eligible receiver. I had to get in shape. I had to get down field and in the open if I was going to get the ball.

[00:27:19] Jim Cathcart: Right. And so it was a long path. But I told you about the Earl Nightingale experience. Part one. Part one was I heard him on the radio and then I, a couple of years later, I was selling his programs. Here's part two. I moved to La Jolla, California, formed a partnership with a college professor there, Dr.

[00:27:40] Jim Cathcart: Tony Alessandro, still my best friend today. And, for five years, we were business partners and we were building our training business. And one day I was sitting in the office in La Jolla. The phone rang. It was Earl Nightingale asking to speak to me.

[00:27:59] Jim Cathcart: I was [00:28:00] speechless. I said, you know, and, and he said, Mr. Cathcart, I read an article of yours that would make a good audio training program. We publish those. I said, oh, believe me, sir, I know. And I said, and the article you read is an audio program that Tony Alessandro and I created. It was the first ever audio program on personality types.

[00:28:23] Jim Cathcart: And it was called relationship strategies for dealing with the differences in people. So he said, we'll send it to me. And if we like it, I'll publish it. So I sent it to him. He said, if you'll rerecord it, we'll take it. So in 1984, Earl Nightingale's company, Nightingale Conant published relationship strategies.

[00:28:46] Jim Cathcart: And in the next two years, they sold. Three and a half million dollars worth worldwide. So consider 72. I heard him on the radio 74. [00:29:00] I sold his cassettes. 84. He was selling mine around the world. In 1989, I was president of the National Speakers Association. I called Earl and I said, Mr Nightingale, would you do me the honor of coming to our speakers convention and standing it or sitting on stage with me in front of 2 or 3000 of your peers and let me interview you about the history, the evolution of this field of self development that we're all involved in.

[00:29:36] Jim Cathcart: He said, I might because it wasn't paid. You know, it was a freebie. He said, I'd like to, I might if I don't have something else that conflicts. And I said, okay, so about March. No, May of that year. I got a call from Earl's wife, Diana, Jim, Diana Nightingale. Hey, Diana. She said, [00:30:00] Jim. Earl passed away. 

[00:30:02] Harry: Oh, 

[00:30:03] Jim Cathcart: I said, Oh man.

[00:30:05] Jim Cathcart: She said, look, we didn't, we're not going to have a funeral for Earl because we had a private ceremony. We scattered his ashes here at home. But I'd like to have a memorial for him at your speaker convention. I said, we would be absolutely honored. And so I said, yeah, it'll be in Dallas in July of 1989 where Earl would have spoken.

[00:30:30] Jim Cathcart: And she said, I want you to speak. I said, no, no, no, no, no. I worthy. This should be world leaders and captains of industry. Earl's Earl's peers, not me. She said, no, Jim, you don't understand. You are what Earl Nightingale was trying to create. You're the product of what he was teaching because you took his message to heart.

[00:30:57] Jim Cathcart: practiced it and transformed your life and [00:31:00] went on to inspire others. And so the only speakers at Earl Nightingale's memorial service in front of hundreds, if not thousands of his peers, including his own son in the audience, David Nightingale. Was his widow, Diana and me in a short video clip from Dennis Whateley.

[00:31:22] Jim Cathcart: Fascinating, 

[00:31:24] Harry: incredible story. Got the chills. What an 

[00:31:26] Jim Cathcart: honor. 

[00:31:27] Harry: Yeah, totally. What would you say is I get heel bumps thinking about that today. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's hard not to. I mean, when you said that he passed, I was thinking in 1989, I said, I was going to ask, well, how old was he? And then you That's when I was When you said he passed, I went, because I was thinking he didn't live a long life. 

[00:31:49] Jim Cathcart: No, he didn't. He was as a young man. He was on board the USS Arizona when it was bombed in Pearl Harbor. He [00:32:00] escaped alive from that and went on to build his life and career. And I think he was in his early 70s. Maybe late sixties. I don't, I don't remember, but he was younger than I am now.

[00:32:16] Jim Cathcart: I'm 77. 

[00:32:17] Harry: Yeah. And you look great. 

[00:32:19] Jim Cathcart: Thank you. 

[00:32:20] Harry: Just saying that 

[00:32:21] Jim Cathcart: you're obviously 

[00:32:21] Harry: doing something right. 

[00:32:23] Jim Cathcart: Yep. 

[00:32:24] Harry: So what was the big, I got to ask this question when you're thrown into these positions, how did you deal with the self doubt? 

[00:32:34] Jim Cathcart: Well, that was Yeah, that's a part of your earlier question that I neglected to reply to.

[00:32:39] Jim Cathcart: I had plenty of self doubt, but I never doubted whether I would keep going. I just doubted whether what I was doing was gonna work or whether I was really worthy. I had a young woman, Olympic gymnast in my audience one time for the American Heart Association special event. [00:33:00] And she said, Mr Cathcart, you know, we're just youth.

[00:33:05] Jim Cathcart: How did you get to the position you're in? You know, did you ever, how did you ever believe that you could do it? And, I thought jeepers, she's, she's an Olympian and she's asking me, we should reverse roles. I said, never occurred to me to quit ever. I mean, people, how do you know you're going to succeed?

[00:33:29] Jim Cathcart: Cause I'm not going to give up. Well, what if it's harder than you thought? Then it's harder. What if it costs more than it's more expensive? What if it takes longer than it takes longer? I'm not giving up. Well, what if you find another career? Probably won't. But if I do, I will, you know, it's just bring it.

[00:33:51] Jim Cathcart: What else have you got? Right. 

[00:33:52] Harry: So beautiful. Either I heard someone pretty famous recently [00:34:00] say there's two potential outcomes, you succeed or you quit. 

[00:34:06] Jim Cathcart: That's right. 

[00:34:07] Harry: All right. And you're just, you nailed that one because you're just not giving up. And so tell us a little bit about your musical, affection there with I will.

[00:34:19] Jim Cathcart: Yes. But first I've got to hitchhike on your last comment. Okay. Les Brown is a famous motivational speaker. 

[00:34:26] Harry: I've heard of him. 

[00:34:27] Jim Cathcart: And one of the things that he says that I just love is he says. It's not over until I win. 

[00:34:36] Harry: Yeah, 

[00:34:37] Jim Cathcart: don't give up. It's not over until I finally ultimately succeed, right? 

[00:34:42] Harry: Yeah, 

[00:34:42] Jim Cathcart: that's music right 

[00:34:44] Harry: there.

[00:34:44] Jim Cathcart: I've always loved music, but, didn't wasn't encouraged to play music. My mom and dad bought a used piano and my sister took piano lessons. I didn't. But they bought a record player. [00:35:00] And got me Elvis and the Everly Brothers and Perry Como and whoever else was on the airways back in the day. And I listened to those records again and again and again and again and again and again and again as a youth.

[00:35:14] Jim Cathcart: In college one day, my roommate, Dan Clanton, taught me how to play three chords on the guitar. And that kind of opened the door for me and I became better and better self taught at playing guitar. To where I could play at parties and play occasionally in a beer joint or a nightclub. And then in 1969, I started doing it professionally.

[00:35:42] Jim Cathcart: And so the year before I got married, I was playing in clubs. And then when I got married, I thought I needed a real job like that wasn't real. And and so I, I went to work in a bank. And then took a job selling mutual funds and a [00:36:00] lot of other things ended up finally in this career, but my love of music never went away in 19.

[00:36:07] Jim Cathcart: No, no. In 2006,

[00:36:09] Jim Cathcart: maybe I was, it's Sherwood Country Club. Thousand Oaks, California is where our home was. I went to, an event and a friend of mine, John Dwight said, Hey, Jim, you play guitar, don't you? And I said, yeah. He said, well, get your guitar out of the closet and come over to the house. We're going to have a hot August night party, Neil Diamond.

[00:36:32] Jim Cathcart: Right. And I said, well, cool. So I grabbed my guitar and I got an old song book. of Neil Diamond songs and I started playing and practicing and I went over to John's house and we had a good time and I said, Hey, next one's on me and we had a guitar night at my house and I brought lots of people and a bunch of guitars.

[00:36:54] Jim Cathcart: And then I went to the country club and I said, I want to host a guitar event. And so they put [00:37:00] on guitar night for the members of Sherwood country club. And I got guitar center, Hollywood to donate for the evening, about a hundred thousand dollars worth of top end guitars for people to try, you know, like a petting zoo of guitars with the potential of buying them.

[00:37:20] Jim Cathcart: And, we had 60 people show up and we did an open mic and my wife and son and I and a couple of friends did most of the songs, but others got up as well. And that led to me being hired by a nightclub, which led me into doing hundreds and hundreds of performances all over the world and recording an album and all that.

[00:37:43] Jim Cathcart: So I love playing guitar and singing. 

[00:37:47] Harry: All right. And what's your favorite kind of music? 

[00:37:50] Jim Cathcart: Baby boom music. Resume the boom. It's time to call the roll again. Resume the boom. That's where I'll never grow [00:38:00] old again. Resume the boom. We still have a dream, sweetheart. Love 

[00:38:05] Harry: it. I mean, here's to the end of the baby.

[00:38:07] Harry: My 

[00:38:08] Jim Cathcart: Yep, and I've written songs that have been recorded and are on on Spotify. 

[00:38:14] Harry: Well, I'm going to find more of you. So for more of Jim Cathcart, I hate to end this conversation. This is good. Yeah, so good. But where can people find more of you, sir? 

[00:38:26] Jim Cathcart: Well, they can find me pretty easily because if you just know the name, Jim Cathcart.

[00:38:32] Jim Cathcart: C A T H C A R T. You can find me on almost all the social media out there, mostly Facebook, mostly LinkedIn, YouTube but a presence on the others as well. But what I do is I train people to be professional experts. So someone says, I've got an expertise of X and I want to build a career around it. Then I say, come with me and let's discover how much more successful [00:39:00] you can be.

[00:39:01] Jim Cathcart: So go to cathcart. com slash experts, and you can see a whole lengthy, long letter describing how that works. And if you want, want to become a certified professional expert, that's something that my company, my Institute does. So just drop me an email, Jim at cathcart. com first name at last name. com. 

[00:39:30] Harry: That is fairly easy.

[00:39:32] Harry: Yep. I'm on that website now. Make Jim your mentor, earn your certified professional experts, CPE and click here to learn now, so I'll put that link in the show notes. This has been a real blast. I'm going to have my kids listen to this one. 

[00:39:50] Jim Cathcart: Oh, thank you. 

[00:39:52] Harry: So good. So, Thanks for the chills throughout this.

[00:39:57] Harry: This has been great. 

[00:39:59] Jim Cathcart: Thank you. Well, I [00:40:00] held back on the heavy stuff. 

[00:40:01] Harry: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We'll save that for next time. 

[00:40:04] Jim Cathcart: Okay. I look forward to it. Well, send me a link to this so I can share it with all my friends. All right. 

[00:40:10] Harry: We'll be 

[00:40:11] Jim Cathcart: happy to do it. And anybody that wants to reach out, please do so. I'm happy to send you a free copy of one of my books, like the book, What to Do When You're the Speaker.

[00:40:22] Jim Cathcart: Yeah, as a matter of fact, they can go to free. F R E E dot Cathcart dot com and just download it directly. Free dot Cathcart dot com will get you a copy of what to do when you're the speaker. And 

[00:40:39] Harry: it won't 

[00:40:39] Jim Cathcart: put you on an endless mailing list or anything like that either. It's just a gift. 

[00:40:45] Harry: 54 lessons in how to master the craft of professional presentations.

[00:40:49] Harry: I am getting that. 

[00:40:51] Jim Cathcart: Dynamite. 

[00:40:52] Harry: All right. 

[00:40:55] Jim Cathcart: I will see you, my friend. Thank you