Episode 163 Alundas Havens The Winners Paradigm Transcript
This transcript is from episode 163 with guest Alundas Havens.
Scott DeLuzio 00:00:00 Thanks for tuning into the Drive On Podcast, where we’re focused on giving hope and strength to the entire military community. Whether you’re a veteran, active duty, guard, reserve, or family member, this podcast will share inspirational stories and resources that are useful to you. I’m your host, Scott DeLuzio, and now let’s get on with the show. Hey, everybody, welcome back to the Drive On Podcast. Today, my guest is Alundas Havens. Alundas is a Marine Corps veteran who hosts The Winners Paradigm podcast, where he helps others learn what they can do to create daily habits that can help them achieve their goals. And in this episode, we’re going to talk a little bit about some of the ways that we can work to better ourselves through some of the things that he talks about on his podcast. Welcome to the show. Why don’t you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, and things like that?
Aludas Havens 00:00:57 Yes, sir. Thank you, Scott, for having me on the show brother, it’s an enormous pleasure to be able to be here and help out other veterans. I’m originally from Fresno, California, which is the center of California, not the good part. Growing up there was a fun time. It’s just a different mindset. It’s looking at somebody differently. It’s a different mindset on the way that people interact and so forth. Basically what I’m saying is my whole life is kind of how my parents raised me and adapted to my environment. I controlled myself in a box and I lived in that box for only thinking of those certain topics. Didn’t really expand, don’t push your beliefs on me, all the way until when I got into high school, I started challenging these things that my stepdad was. He was real conservative and it wasn’t that he was conservative.
Aludas Havens 00:01:48 It was just some of the things he would say was outdated or ingested. That’s where, when you start challenging those things, people get upset. It was one of those where it was like, you can’t say this because now you’re hyper analyzing everything. Someone saying it was one of those where it was like, Hey, who do I want to be? I started realizing that there were a lot of things that I didn’t agree with, that he was doing and that’s okay. That’s where we’re able to revitalize and see. I ended up getting kicked out of my house. I’m bumming it off my friend’s couches. When I was about 16, I started just going home every day. I would do my chores out of the state with my friends because I knew an altercation with my stepdad would happen eventually in order to get kicked out.
Aludas Havens 00:02:26 Ultimately that did happen when I turned 18. I moved back in a week later, called my recruiter. Hey brother, I need to get up outta here. Shipped out three months early, probably the best thing I ever did in my life. I ended up going to the Marine Corps, came home from boot, left a traumatic event that almost changed that did change my life. But it could have been a lot worse. That was one of the eye-openers where it was like this place that you call home is not your home don’t ever go back. Coming to that point, it was really tough for me. I had two friends that died then, while I was in the Marine Corps, a third friend that had cancer died before I went on deployment. That was tough trying to be in that mindset, but knowing that you were still hurting, but us as veterans, we push everything to the side, we keep going.
Aludas Havens 00:03:09 It was not really understanding who I was certainly, but it was going through all these traumatic events and not knowing, eventually, deploy come back and it was, it was quite funny. I jumped a little head. It was funny because I was in the Marine Corps for three weeks. They said, Hey, we’re sending you to Yuma for training. Go out there for two and a half months and find out I was there a month early. I’ve wasted another month, just doing admin work, blah, blah, blah, two and a half months go by. All right, well, let’s go back to the unit. I get back to the unit for a week, actually, you’re going to months. I go out there for another two and a half months, get back to the unit, oh, three months, we’re going to deploy.
Aludas Havens 00:03:47 It was a boom., moving super-fast, came back from deployment. Actually had the opportunity to be operations and training chief, as a position. That’s where I started to learn about business, how to learn, and how to publicly speak. I’d be in the room with all the staff and CEOs. That was definitely a tough challenge for me because I got promoted day of. I didn’t have my own ego and I didn’t know who I particularly was. I was trying to learn how to be able to talk and they’re gonna eat that stuff up, if they realize when you start talking to them, I had to go up there, staff Sergeant, and say Hey, this is what we need done. This is what the CEO wants.
Aludas Havens 00:04:26 This is what Sergeant Major wants. Oh, we’re not going to do training. All right. Your million’s not going to get promoted to me to get this done. We’re not getting promoted or they’re like, I’m not going to do this training, what you want to know is coming from Sergeant Major. I went to run as a Sergeant Major, and it was a good time there. Ended up tearing all the cartilage in my right knee. From there, I got pulled off a board, a Sergeant board. and it was tough for me mentally because it was stripping me of everything I was. At that time I was working my butt off working 16 to 18 hours going to school on this side. It was tough because I created who I wanted to be.
Aludas Havens 00:05:02 I worked on it, I was achieving everything, but then I got that injury and it was all of a sudden, you’re on the shelf. You’re not who you are. It was learning a new identity. Unfortunately, I had to get out of the Marine Corps because I could not fix my issue. I whittled it down to my last three weeks. Oh, I’m going to get surgery. Actually, my surgeon got orders. I go to the specialist, Adam, and give you an extension. Adam is like, no, we don’t give you a medical extension, go back to medical and I’m going back and forth. They said, well, you can do two physical fitness tests and then a combat fitness test. and then they go, but if you do go on a limb, do it a third time, that’s where it’s gonna be malingering. I’m done.
Aludas Havens 00:05:37 Like I’ve gone through this. I excelled, I accomplished what I wanted to, for the most part, I wanted to be a recruiter. Wasn’t able to do that. but I said, Hey, my body’s ticking. It fell apart completely. It was one injury after the next. SI said, Hey, I need to get out at least for the next couple of years. I can start learning about myself and what I am and that led me to eventually starting my own podcast, where I took that leap, The Winners Paradigm, and it’s all about recalibrating your mindset so you can achieve what you want. That was a big portion of my journey. Now being able to jump into it. It’s awesome. Being able to talk to other veterans as yourself, Scott, where you can just talk to them about life and the things we struggle as veterans.
Aludas Havens 00:06:18 I was one of those that was so fixated in that mindset of drilling into people or respect, I’d say the Marine Corps, that’s the one thing in the days when you walk in if not, they’d be like go back and start messing with you. Well, civilian sector people walk on by and just stare at you. I’m like, Hey, how are you doing brother? They don’t say anything to me. I’m like, what’s your problem? Then I ended up coming in, I worked at a mortgage brokerage and it was hard for me to transition because I’m talking to and keeping in mind at that time. I’m 22, 23, I’m talking to kids and I hate using that word. But in the Marine Corps, I learned that if you call someone a kid, they’re gonna identify themselves as that.
Aludas Havens 00:06:56 But these kids were 22, 23 as myself, but they were just on a complete other spectrum because they either were going to school. Their parents help them their whole life, but they never really understood how to communicate with people mature a little bit. So it was difficult for me because I’m getting in arguments or people are like, oh, what did you do? Did you just sleep on your mom’s couch? I got kicked out of my house. One of the Marine Corps accomplished all these things, got married, realized who I wanted to be. Luckily I did it at a young age, I don’t have to waste more years of my life being destructive. Great time there, brother.
Scott DeLuzio 00:07:31 That good background or a good description of your background gives us an idea of kind of where you’re coming from, what your path was, your history, and everything like that. One of the things that kinda, turned me on to having you on the show is this thought: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That’s why I wanted to have you join me today because you talk about making those changes in your habits or routines in your daily life that actually produce different results Because if we’re just sitting here and we’re, we’re doing the same thing, trying to get ahead with the same level of education that we had, all along not going back to school and trying to better ourselves or, working the same dead-end job and hoping that someday you’re going to just wake up and start enjoying it.
Scott DeLuzio 00:08:36 It doesn’t work that way. I want to talk to you about some of these changes that people make. I know on your show, you talk about that with some of your guests, but also in your own life, what some of the things were that caused you to flip the script in your own life and decide this is not the way I want it to continue going. I recognize that some change needs to be made, how did that happen and how did you come to that conclusion that what I need to make these changes?
Aludas Havens 00:09:18 Great question, brother. I take that one hard. The reason why I say that is that my parents weren’t the greatest they tried, but they were real young. My dad partied, did drugs, did everything you can think of. It was seeing all these things for yourself, seeing the materialistic things, the Corvette, the nice car, and it’s like all that to him, not being happy, you still getting a divorce or he’s almost 50 years old, still acting that way. Or when he would come down, when, when I was stationed in San Diego, she would come down and be like, Hey, let’s go drink. It was do I want to be that person? Not that some people think that’s cool, but it’s different when you still have younger kids. But it’s just, I don’t want to be partying until four o’clock in the morning.
Aludas Havens 00:10:00 I developed a big drinking problem because of the trauma from when I was a child on boot leave, certain things that happened to me that I just used that wall and I protected myself from people because of that. Now the fortunate thing is I got married, and all that stuff came out. Every single insecurity, everything that happened to me as a child, all of a sudden started coming out. I started coming out that maybe I’m not family-oriented and it’s because my family is not like that. They only want you for your value. I used the term, I had gone to a leadership course. He said it’s transactional. That’s where I figured I think I like that way. if you can’t provide me value, if it’s not positive energy, I’m not going to be around you.
Aludas Havens 00:10:45 With my family, it’s the total opposite, they’re fixed and what they’re doing, they like to talk about something perfect. An example is starting a podcast. Why would you want to do that? It was, oh, no, one’s going to give a shit about what you have to say. Excuse me. I don’t know. You’re good. Okay. Thank you. It was kind of like, what we do think is that, when we’re in the military, we get taught, shut up and do what you’re supposed to do, keep going. we push everything to the side. The problem is, we don’t acknowledge what’s going on. We get fixated in that little path or whatever it is. When we get to that dead-end job, no one cares. We’re just going to keep pushing what one year turns into five years.
Aludas Havens 00:11:24 Yeah. I’m not that person. I promised myself after the Marine Corps, I would never be in a position where I was behind leadership. It was something to where it was like I had nowhere to grow. I had two leaders, one of them an amazing individual terrible leader. pull me to the side, start chewing me out. You’re a piece of crap and so forth, and go for that. But it was one of those where I could take it, I could take the butt chewing and be cool with it, but it was one of those words. Like, I don’t want that to be me. Luckily my Marines shaped in a different way where I learned that they all have their different personalities and get trained differently. but I promised myself then that I would never be behind a leader that I didn’t believe in.
Aludas Havens 00:12:02 When I got off the Marine Corps, one of my staff Sergeant she’s like, are you ever going to talk to me? Do you want to grow up? I said, no, there’s no way that I’ll ever be in the same room with you. You can’t provide me with anything. She’s just one of those manipulative people. They would use politics, or they would go behind me and I would have a plan set. This is what our training plan is. She would go in there, mess it up and then tell me to fix it. Why didn’t you just leave it originally? How it was, but it was a pride thing. She had to take the recognition. It was learning all those things, learning that I didn’t want to be, that I started drinking about a gallon of whiskey to cope with learning that I had a problem.
Aludas Havens 00:12:36 Eventually my wife kept telling me and it was, hitting that point where it was, what am I going to do? Like I said, I had three good friends die. My grandfather died when I got out of the Marine Corps, which is the tip of the iceberg because that was like my dad for me, and it was, who am I going to go to now, I leaned on my father-in-law because he’s the dad I never had, but it was awesome. Learning that I can be who I want to be. If I take some steps if I’m mature and learn how to cope with things and be able to talk about these things that stricken me or, the way I perceive things is completely different because I was realizing, when I get in certain rooms with people, I would automatically check out of the conversation if they start thinking one way, because of what they said.
Aludas Havens 00:13:20 But when I realized it’s experience, that’s when the game changed for me was, Hey, they didn’t realize what you went through. You obviously didn’t go through what they did. if you can try to enlighten them perfectly, if not, not, everybody’s gonna agree with you, not everybody’s going to understand. Those were a little bit of the things, brother, that really got me moving to start the podcast and change my whole personality, who I was, because I wasn’t happy anymore, going through it. I’ve always been pushing, doing something. I always have to be two things at once, but it was hitting that point where I was, I don’t like these people around me. They’re not doing it. These people just want to drink. Well, I stopped drinking all of a sudden, you’re a square. What I am. I like to read books now. It was different. when you start realizing those things, maybe I was just with the wrong crowd. Then you get around the right crowd, all of a sudden, you get that light bulb go off and it’s an amazing feeling.
Scott DeLuzio 00:14:12 I like that the light bulb goes off and you come to this realization, it’s like, this is where I need to be. This is the path I need to be on. Then things just seem like they start to fall in place a little bit easier than they were when you were spinning your wheels stuck in that same situation. I know we probably have some listeners who are out there who feel like they’re stuck in a rut that they’re spinning their wheels. I guess I was saying, what is like, step one to getting out of that rut and flipping the script on, on their own lives, to get to that point. They see that, that path. Like the light is now shining. This is, this is where I need to be going.
Aludas Havens 00:15:00 Yes, sir. For this one, I’m going to add a little onto it. I like to do a three-step because you can’t have just step one because some people are going to think, all right, step one, you got to find what you want. Some people are, oh, I know what I want. I want to be a doctor. Well, then you obviously got to go to school. But for someone who doesn’t want to be a doctor, maybe you want to be a real estate agent. Maybe you want to start your landscape company. You need to figure out what you want to do. Then from there find somebody who is doing it, we have a great tool out there Facebook, LinkedIn, when I got out of the Marine Corps, someone approached me on LinkedIn and it was a financial advisor.
Aludas Havens 00:15:36 I’m like, Hey brother, I ain’t got money like that right now. It was, no, I just want to be your friend. I want to help you out through this journey. Madeline’s amazing, connecting me with other individuals that I can talk to. That’s why I would say first figure out what you want to do because I’m not going to be that one. I’m going to college. I’m probably finishing up my businessman management degree, but I realized college isn’t for me, I’m doing it for my professional career. Post-graduate possibly in the future after I start my business. But that’s not what I need to be able to have my own business. That’s my goal is having my own business. A degree is going to help you, it’s going to allow you to network, but at the same time, there’s other ways to do it.
Aludas Havens 00:16:12 You can get into LinkedIn, Facebook groups, veteran groups are amazing because veterans aren’t gonna tell each other, no, we’re a community. We help each other. definitely fine. What you want to do, is get involved with the group. That’s one of the things I did as well. When I got out of the Marine Corps, I ended up following a podcast group on Facebook and I started saying, Hey, you guys are amazing people. You changed my life with kind of a perspective when it first started shifting. Then one guy messaged me and that’s actually my mentor now. He was just like, Hey brother, I’m an army captain retired, or I just got out of the service. Let me know if you have any questions, you need anything. It was that one conversation that I’ll hit them up every so often.
Aludas Havens 00:16:55 Hey brother, and so forth. Yeah. I have a question about this. Definitely find that person you can confide in, that’s doing what you want to do so you can learn, Hey, what kind of steps do I need to take if it means going to school? Absolutely. you got to take your steps, stride by stride. Sometimes I’m not going to lie. When I first got back into college in the Marine Corps, that was tough.it was trying to relearn everything because the way we learned in the military is completely different.
Scott DeLuzio 00:17:20 Yeah, for sure. You said if you need to go to school, I obviously go to school. For whatever it is that you want to do. But one thing I think sometimes people get stuck in their head is that school looks like, a traditional four-year college or something like that. Depending on what it is that you want to do, that may not even be the school that you want, that is the best route for you. if you want to be an electrician or a plumber, a some, some trade type job, then a four-year degree. I mean, yeah, it’s going to help, especially if you want to, start your own company somewhere down the line that’s not probably the first step that you want to be taking.
Scott DeLuzio 00:18:03 You probably want to know, get that, that trade under your belt and do that. I actually had a guy on the podcast a while back and he actually used the GI Bill to become a yoga instructor. He went to training, the school, whatever it was. He was able to get that training and that certification, whatever it is that he needed to do, I forget the exact terminology or whatever that they call it. he was able to get it through, through all of that. Now that’s what he does. He teaches yoga and he is living the life that he wants to be living. He’s doing things that he’s passionate about, that he’s happy with, and everything. To me, that’s an incredible success story.
Scott DeLuzio 00:18:52 He was in this dark place. He was depressed. He didn’t know really what was going on with his life and everything. Now he’s doing great things and enjoying it along the way. absolutely. I guess my point is, I think outside of the box too, you don’t necessarily need to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a four-year degree for certain things. You’re going to need that. If that’s what you want to do, then absolutely. You’re going to have to go to school for that. But, other things you may not need to, and you may be happier doing some of those other things too. Think about those and consider those along the way as well.
Aludas Havens 00:19:32 I had one more thing, Scott, I’m going to find a mentor. Now, this is where it’s up to you. If you’re in that position if you’re comfortable, if you have to pay for a mentor, I agree. I do that myself now that I was able to build up, to have a little bit more money, was able to get my VA disability up 50 extra dollars a month, goes towards a mastermind group where I’m able to learn from other people, but also joining a mastermind group, you’re able to network. For instance, for the podcast, I can just go to the network. Hey, who wants to connect and be able to talk about X, Y, and Z, and be able to get that. Then at the same time, get that expert level, what’s going to lead you to being able to execute it where you can say, all right, this is what I want.
Aludas Havens 00:20:14 This who is helping me. This is what I’m going to do every single day. Maybe it’s waking up, brushing your teeth. First thing, not checking the phone, doing those small changes that you’re not going to notice. You’re going to think, oh, this cookie cutter works because if you apply it, you’re finally going to understand sometimes, okay. Yeah. Maybe I shouldn’t do that. Maybe I should prioritize a little more. Maybe I should listen or be able to actually reach out to others and say, Hey, what are you doing? That’s working. What am I doing? That’s not working. Then, you’re going to have to listen to what you don’t want to hear. The faster you can get over that faster. You’re going to succeed.
Scott DeLuzio 00:20:48 Yeah, for sure. I’ve been in a mastermind, a couple of different mastermind groups in the past. Sometimes the stuff that you hear in those groups is not stuff that you want to hear, but it’s stuff that you need to hear. That’s a great way if you’re willing to accept that advice and feedback, as a great way to get yourself moving out of that rut because it’s going to challenge you to do things that maybe you wouldn’t have done otherwise and just push, push you and make you become a better version of yourself. I liked that you mentioned the mastermind group because that’s something I honestly don’t know that we really talked much about on this podcast before. But for anyone who’s unfamiliar with mastermind ins are, they’re really, a group of other people in whatever industry that you might be in other it could be other business owners could be other people who are doing the same type of work that you do that they’re familiar with your industry and you bounce ideas off each other and you help each other out and you ask for advice and everything.
Scott DeLuzio 00:22:02 It’s really just a group of people trying to help each other out is absolutely my experience anyways. So you go further together when you have other people who are working with you, especially veterans because veterans will actually go out of their way to help you. When you have that group of people who are willing to help each other it’s just gonna make it so much easier because sometimes you get stuck so much in your own head of I need to do this, It’s like trying to fit a square peg through a round hole, and it’s just not going to work. Then you get someone else’s perspective and you’re like, oh what, stupid I got to just grab that round peg and I’ll fit it through that round hole. Boom, now I got it. Now I know I have this solution in front of me here.
Aludas Havens 00:22:52 Exactly.
Scott DeLuzio 00:22:53 That’s exactly what the mastermind group. Therefore, I’m glad that you mentioned that.
Aludas Havens 00:22:59 What’s also funny about that as well is that earlier I was talking about that army officer. That reached out to me while I told him, I said, Hey brother, I don’t care. what it is, you’re gonna be the first guest on my podcast because you inspired me to take action. In that episode, it was kind of funny because I listed the questions that I wanted and I wanted to talk about it, and then the questions were up. I was like, oh, what’s next? But anyway, it was funny learning that point, showing that growth now. But it was awesome talking to him because he talked about right now, you may not have the skills that you need. All you have to do is start studying it. Like we said, mastermind groups are something you can read books, you can do audiobooks, you can watch YouTube videos.
Aludas Havens 00:23:41 He was showing me, Hey, if you put the time in, you will be able to develop that skill. In his case, he did the same thing. He does Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He was able to start a podcast about Brazilian jiu-jitsu and started interviewing people. He learned how to market digital and became a consultant that was hired on by a company. Now he’s a CML for another company. It was awesome, learning that. Then eventually they approached me and they said, Hey, do you want to be a moderator for our group? We’re always active. You’re talking to other people, you’re networking, you’re helping us out. Would you like to be a part of the team, attracting new people to be a part of it? It was awesome learning that, it was kind of funny.
Aludas Havens 00:24:20 I told them the same thing. It was like what, you’re a hundred percent. Like I’m not there a hundred percent developing the skill, but it’s still going, I’m learning so much. And now I’m able to apply for that job. So that was one of the things, some people don’t think sometimes, oh, I need money. I need this. If you don’t, you can join a free group. You can be able to challenge people, ask those questions. Then for you, just start analyzing, seeing what you’re doing, okay. If you’re interested in making YouTube videos, maybe it’s car will start watching a little bit of videos and start learning a little more. Then from there, you will be able to apply that later on because you’re eventually going to pick it up so much and realize it before your eyes.
Scott DeLuzio 00:24:59 Yeah, absolutely. I know that the environment that we are in also affects the outcomes that we see. I know you were talking a bit about your upbringing and how that environment wasn’t the best for a successful outcome in certain areas. I have talked to other deaths too, on this podcast where they grew up in an area that they fell in with the wrong crowd. They got into drinking or drugs or whatever. They realized that if I just keep staying around these people, I’m not going to change like nothing’s going to change. This one guy in particular that I had on the podcast a while back, ended up moving and it wasn’t an easy move because he left everything, all his friends, his family, they were all toxic in his life.
Scott DeLuzio 00:25:54 He moved away, hundreds of miles from these people. He never wanted to see these people again, because they weren’t helping him there. If anything, they were weighing him down and they were moving him in the wrong direction. Now he’s a successful business owner. He’s happily married as a family and everything, and life is going well for him. I think that that’s something that we need to consider as well in, in some of this insanity that I was talking about doing the same thing over and over and again, and again, and expecting different results for hanging out around the same people who are not encouraging us to get better, or are actually actively encouraging us to do the opposite. We ended up getting worse off because of them. We can’t expect much to change at that point. I know you were talking about these mastermind groups and finding mentors and stuff, but what kind of people should we surround ourselves with if we want to achieve certain kinds of goals?
Aludas Havens 00:26:58 That is a great question. I’ll do a two-part on that because I know earlier, I didn’t really touch up when I was saying leaving that crowd. I absolutely was, it was a mom at the same exact people, at the, my sophomore year in high school, one of my best friends from childhood, he hung out with a crowd of people that were all drug dealers, and it was funny hanging out with them because they were cool dudes. But for me, it was like, that’s not for me. What I’m going to do is actually be that middle one. I was like, Hey, you need something here, push him to this guy. Or what I’ll do is I’ll see that they’re smoking or something. I’d be like, oh, let me go to the store for you guys.
Aludas Havens 00:27:33 I would say, Hey, give me 10 bucks. I’ll go buy you whatever you want, but I’m going to get something or keep the couple of dollars. I’ll do that for a couple of bucks. That was how I was able to make money. One of my boys would always give me money, but I thought, this is it. This is cool. It was one of those, as the slick one, getting everybody out of trouble talking all the time, the police officers are always like looking at us, looking at us what we’re doing. Hey officer, how are you doing today? Oh, how could I help you? I took interest in what they were doing. So I created this image to where I was learning something. It was funny as originally, my first school, my first high school I was at, I actually got thrown against the wall, searched one time.
Aludas Havens 00:28:10 It wasn’t even like, I didn’t have anything on me. I was a freshman at that time, didn’t even know about drugs, but didn’t really like being around those people yet. It was funny when I was somewhat associated and then, police officers were always looking in the town I was in. It was funny with that, holding that balance. One of my cousins ended up getting strung out on meth. Then he started having, my friends that were gang banging, coming out to me, Hey, bro, we’re about to jump you. What’s good? Your cousins talking all this, you’ll just have some money. I’m like, well, that’s on him. Then my cousin’s family. I’m like, that’s not how family is family. Don’t string each other out to dry.
Aludas Havens 00:28:47 They don’t have that. People ain’t trying to break into your house again. Like these are all things that are easily managed, but eventually one of my cousin’s best friends, two of his best friends died. One woman end up getting murdered. It was one of those things where it was like, is this what you want? Do you want to be around these people? Once I stopped, surrounding it, I ended up moving, and I was wrestling, made some more friends and they were cool, but they weren’t really trying to do anything with their life. They just wanted to party and do whatever talk shit. For me, I ended up getting embarrassed because something happened with my family that got out to the whole town. Everybody was judging me, oh, this and that my own family didn’t want me to go in the same room with them.
Aludas Havens 00:29:26 Because they thought my mom had an affair. So it was one of those things where it was like, I’m over here saying, oh no, that’s not true. Well, the dude she did almost got shot by my stepdad. It was this thing where everybody was coming after me. Then I said, what? I’m good. I don’t need any of you guys because you’re living where I want to be. You’re not doing it. You’re not replicating it. Obviously, if you’re running your mouth in front of me, that means you’re saying something about me behind me. That was where it clicked for me. It’s like, Hey, these people are toxic. They’re bad. Then it goes to that concept of who do you want to be? If you do want to be that person, what are those people that are there doing?
Aludas Havens 00:30:02 That’s where I started looking into it. The mastermind groups helped me because I was able to get a mentor, but it’s in any case, what are you, what are you thinking of? If you want to be a business owner, what are the top business owners doing well? They have excellent time management skills. They know how to network. They know how to market social media and how to reach out to their audience. Those are all the things you start developing slowly. Or in this case, just start watching their posts, look at the structure. Okay. They’re structuring it this way. Look at the headlines. Maybe reading’s not for you. You can try audiobooks. Maybe that’s not for you. You can do YouTube videos. But anyway, it’s all about making those monumental increases.
Aludas Havens 00:30:38 That’s going to lead you to be who you are. It’s all about making those monumental increases in saying, Hey This is where I want to be at. This is what I want to do. And it sucks. It sucks because right now that may not be who you are. It may take a little bit more work, but you can definitely do that. All you gotta do is find where you want to be and then find a way to get into there. Because I know sometimes you want to be somewhere, but those people are in a different crowd. Maybe just slowly get integrated. Maybe you never asked for something directly, but say, Hey Can I help you with this? Or maybe you go, you want to help out a business owner and you go and you start doing janitorial work for them. Then slowly building that relationship to be able to say, Hey, can I do something for you? So you’re able to provide that value versus going directly and asking somebody for something you don’t know.
Scott DeLuzio 00:31:26 Okay. Yeah. I can see that too. That works. Now, what if it’s a situation where we’re unsure about whether or not we could be trying this new thing, maybe it’s something like what I’m kind of interested in. Maybe, they’re worried they’re gonna invest some time or resources into this new thing. Maybe all this extra energy that they’re going to be diving into some, some new path, new, a new career or a new education path or whatever like that. they worry that they’re going to find out that, what, this isn’t for me now, how do you go and approach a situation like that? You’re not feeling like you’re, you’re just treading water and just stuck where you are because you’re, you’re almost afraid to try that next thing.
Aludas Havens 00:32:14 That is a good question. I actually saw a video on this the other day. And it said for those of you who are 28 years old right now, you’re thinking about getting a four-year degree, but you don’t want to, because you’re going to be 32. Well, let me tell you, in four years, you’re still going to be 32. I thought that was funny because it’s symbolic. Yes. Sometimes we don’t want to take that leap. Sometimes we don’t. But you have two options. You can either stay in that hole. You dug yourself in and in and think about what could have been, or you can take action. Maybe you, you fail. I jumped into a mortgage brokerage. I’m going to school. I have a family. I’m starting a podcast. I’m researching all in my off time.
Aludas Havens 00:32:52 Then I have to work on my mortgage broker exam. While I failed three times, I couldn’t pass the test. It was something where other people around me were, but when I looked at it, I had so much on my plate. I’m up at four or five o’clock in the morning going to the gym. Then it’s working all day, then it’s family, and then it studies it. It’s like, when I got my time to do what I had to do, it wasn’t that, it was executing on reading a book, maybe doing homework to where I was over cramming. Didn’t give myself the chance to succeed. You really got to look at it and say, Hey why am I failing? Maybe it’s because of this. Then you’re able to regroup.
Aludas Havens 00:33:26 I realized after that, yeah, I was failing because I was doing way too many things. Maybe that’s not what I was supposed to do at that time. So in the end we bought a house and moved on from that. That was where I was able to see, Hey now I’m falling into the right place because I was able to see exactly what I wanted to do so that you will, you’re right. There’s going to be times where you jump into something. I don’t really know. Podcasting definitely is that because you have that fear of identity, you don’t want to be talking and saying something that you aren’t, because people are going to pick up on that. You gotta be transparent and say, exactly. That was one of those for, for me. I was like, ah, is, is this it?
Aludas Havens 00:34:01 Well, let’s stick with it a little bit. Maybe let’s get some help. Let’s see if what we’re saying is legitimate. Then from there, that’s where it’s able to grow. You gotta take that leap regardless. You’re going to fail. Everybody fails. If you look at it, even the most successful people in the world, either had a bankruptcy or they failed at something at some point in time, you just go through it. it’s about what you want in the end and who you want to become. If you want to be that same person, well, then you’re going to keep spinning those wheels. But if you want to say, what, this is it. I want to try something and it could just be like doing one thing and it could be watching one YouTube video and, oh, okay.
Aludas Havens 00:34:39 Now that’s changing or going on Tik TOK and watch it one little TikTok. Those are the things that you do. That’s going to change your mindset. Or maybe you’re like, oh, I’m going to look into this. We’ll start researching slowly. Then you’ll be able to want to versus having that fear of saying, I can’t do it. what you can’t, if you want to say you can’t, you can’t do it because you’re putting that limitation on yourself. But when you change it and say, what, I’m going to try, I’m going to do something or maybe listen to somebody. That’s another big thing is when you do get those people telling you, Hey, this is what you need to do. That’s where you start saying, all right, well, they told me I need to do it. You start executing. Then you realize, okay, this may be where I need to be.
Scott DeLuzio 00:35:16 Yeah, absolutely. it all boils down to just try something, and give it a shot. Like you said, you, you may, you may fail at it. But as long as you’re not looking at failure as, a failure, looking as,, an opportunity to learn something new, whether it’s something new about yourself or the thing that you’re trying or whatever, it’s not truly a failure. You’ve learned something. That’s a success in my book. You’re moving on to bigger, better things when you try things like that. I think that’s spot on, what are some books or other resources that might be available to help people kind of understand, and maybe get started on this journey to getting out of this rut and stop doing the same things over and over again, and start trying to find a better path for themselves.
Aludas Havens 00:36:18 That is a good question. What’s funny is I actually have a stack of like 20 bucks on my desk right here. one of the first books, and this is where mindset and who you are shapes you. First book, excuse me. I was going to join a pyramid scheme and they told me to read a book. I read that first book, boom, right then from there, it was all of a sudden I read books now. I was like, well, what do I want to read this stuff? Doesn’t interest me. This all sucks. I went into gravitating towards my interests. One of my favorite rappers is 50 Cent. He has a book Hustle, Harder Hustle, and smarter. If you ever heard of it. Phenomenal book, he talks about how he was on the street and how he was drug doing to where that parallels to, commercial life, and talking about when he’s in the corporate world and he’s working on his album and this and that, in the strategies behind it talks about how they would use different strategies.
Aludas Havens 00:37:15 Like he trashed the boardroom, for instance, one time and people thought, oh, he’s upset. No, that was all strategic because they knew if they did that, they’re gonna promote the album. They’re gonna promote whatever they’re doing. It’s going to draw attention. It was tension, excuse me. It was all those things where it was like learning. Okay, well, he did it that helped, what I’m saying? In my case, because I was stuck in that belief where it was like, this is me. You’re not going to change me. From there that allowed me to expand it. Next book I read. When I got out of the Marine Corps, 48 Laws of Power, a dangerous book, I wish I’d never read that book at that time. The reason why it took me the last two months in the Marine Corps to realize how to defeat my boss, was that it was giving me all this harm, making my life a living hell.
Aludas Havens 00:37:58 When I literally could have just read this book and realized, oh, just let her be. Don’t say anything to her. If it’s a staff meeting, she needs you to tell her some communication. You told her, just let her be a fool in there. People are going to start picking up on it slowly. They did. People were like, what the heck is going on? We need you, we need your expertise. We need you to be able to handle these problems versus trying to take us down these different routes. 48 Laws of Power, How to Win Friends and Influence People, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Another one I like was Unfuck Your Business because it really goes into that one. And then, the other one that I love so much with David Goggins can’t hurt me because he just dove straight into it, where you start getting the mental being abused.
Aludas Havens 00:38:45 I went through that as well, to talk about, gaining weight, not being who you are. And then just saying that his mental fortitude is something amazing. and, us as veterans, we often have that same mentality that what’s known gives us AF to keep pushing. Well, let’s use that to our advantage. what no one does. They only realize what you’re doing until you pay for it. Let’s make it. Let’s prove that, and every single day we’re going to keep pushing, regardless of the case, and that’s where listening to David Goggins, per se, aligned with me feeling that way about my family, about my friends, who’ve passed my family who passed, where I was like, it’s a disservice to not do as well as I should do. It’s a disservice to not live up to my goals because these people ain’t here no more to do it as well. when some of them were young. It was one of those where it was like, do I want to keep doing this? Obviously, if you read that book, you’re definitely going to feel empowered to take action.
Scott DeLuzio 00:39:42 Yeah, for sure. That’s a great list of books. I haven’t heard of all of those, but I’ll definitely check some of those out because it sounds like they have some good information in there. One more I’d love to add to the list if I could is, and I’ve talked about it on the podcast before, but it’s called the Atomic Habits. For anyone who hasn’t read the book, it’s really just about how you can make small, incremental changes in your own life to achieve your goals, whatever it happens to be they use, like weight loss or fitness as an example in the book, a few times. You’re looking to drop 25 pounds or something like that, you can’t expect that you’re going to do something.
Scott DeLuzio 00:40:33 By the end of the week, you’re going to have all 25 pounds dropped like that. It just doesn’t work that way. Or if it did, you’re doing it the unhealthy way. You can’t do it. That’s not sustainable. You can’t do it that way., if you make those small changes in your diet instead of picking up a piece of candy, you pick up a piece of fruit or some vegetables or something instead as a snack, then those little incremental changes are going to help you get to where you need to go.
Aludas Havens 00:41:03 Exactly brother. That’s exactly what I was going to say. I have the four steps right here, how to build a habit on my wall that I read every single day. I gotta make it obvious. I gotta make it attractive, easy, and satisfying. I’m able to learn what to do to build those habits. That’s what I extracted from that book. I use it in everyday life.
Scott DeLuzio 00:41:22 Yeah. That’s, that’s a cool thing about it is, it’s something that you can use in everyday life. It can help you create new habits that are good, positive habits, things that you want to do to help you achieve whatever your goals are, professionally, personally. It also helps you stop doing the bad things, those negative habits, whether it’s smoking or eating junk food. It can help you do the opposite too. It works both ways. It’s really amazing when you think about it and when you read the book and go through some of those steps like you were, you were just talking about those four steps. It really does help to kind of hone in on what the thing is that you’re trying to do or not do, and develop the habits that will help you achieve the goals that you’re looking for. I think that that’s a good example as well. Talk a bit about your podcast. I know you talked a lot about getting into podcasting and everything like that, but I’d like to give you the chance to share your podcast, what it’s all about and what people can expect to take away from it when, when they listen to it.
Aludas Havens 00:42:52 Absolutely in my podcast is called the Winners Paradigm. Like I said earlier, it’s about recalibrating your mindset to be who you want to be. That’s where I jumped into talking about early life. I talk about how kind of the relationship with my father is and how in one episode it was actually amazing. I had another gentleman on, and we’re talking about fatherhood. And I said, I just had a daughter, versus my wife and I just had a baby. I have a daughter now, and I don’t want to be that same dad that I had because it was the Drill Sergeant yelling. You’re a piece of this. It was amazing because I was accustomed to it. By the time I got to boot camp, they’re yelling at me, I’m laughing. They’re like, why are you laughing? Because I went through this, of course, they make you like, not laugh because they can do worse.
Aludas Havens 00:43:34 But it was one of those where it was like, the relationship we had was terrible and it was, I don’t want that to be for my kids. There’s an episode. We go on that, we talk about fatherhood things we can do. That’s all it’s about, it was just really bettering ourselves, counting our wins, figuring out how we extract wins from growth? How do we be able to get out of this ditch? Or maybe it’s talking about mindset like we said earlier, atomic habits, maybe it’s talking about that book. Maybe it’s getting people on and talking about our failures or talking about how they’re able to accomplish their dreams by just taking a little bit of initiative. I really hone in on the mental aspect of it, we can be able to prepare ourselves with those tools.
Aludas Havens 00:44:14 Then from there and say, here’s these books, here’s this interview. You can be able to see exactly what it’s like when you’re hearing from somebody who’s been there and done that. My favorite thing is just talking about that mental mindset. Because I know for me, I got so bad into it where it was no one cares, I don’t care. I don’t want to even talk to you. And it was like, Hey, why am I turning into this? But once you’re able to actually acknowledge those things and talk about that, yes, we got stuck in a rut. I tore all the cartilage in my right knee, got out of the Marine Corps. That was the worst thing. I was feeling so good when I was the corporal, I was in a wind meritorious Sergeant, I got pulled off the board and it was like, now you’re trash for, and then the Marine Corps comes out with the new order.
Aludas Havens 00:44:55 You have to have four-years time and service to pick up. Now I’m going to wait for another extra. If I would’ve stayed in, I would’ve gotten promoted for another two years. I’ve been a full-year corporal based on that rule and me getting injured. It was one of those. It was like, who, who are you? I love diving deep into that because that’s where that growth happens. When you acknowledge what’s happened to you in that we all deal with our struggles, whether you came from the greatest family or the worst, you’re going to have that time where you’re going to run into something because I have a couple of friends like that where they’re well off came into it, but they don’t know how to communicate with people because they’re so used to giving, getting what they want, that they don’t know how to ask people.
Aludas Havens 00:45:34 They come off ignorant or arrogant. It’s one of those where you’re like, Hey bro, you need to work on it because they don’t notice these things just as we don’t for me, I used to pop off all the time and want to prove somebody wrong. Then I realized the results, speaking for myself. Why do I need to explain myself? I don’t need to go in getting this engagement with somebody where it’s just degrading each other’s character. There’s no reason to do it anymore at this time. We’re not seeing each other, but let’s be able to take some time to be able to separate so you can collect your thoughts, and not ruin your energy. I really love diving into our energy kind of plant-based medicine or anything we can do to make our lives better because I know another thing that’s big as well is how the VA will just give us medication for our problems.
Aludas Havens 00:46:21 That’s not necessarily what’s going to help us for me. They said, oh, we’re going to give you antidepressants. I start flipping out. That’s not how they work. I’m like, I can’t take that. This is the second time already. All of a sudden, it’s my fault I’m forcing myself to have panic attacks. So it was one of those where I was like, how could I be able to get around this problem? Get through my shit. Because I was struggling with severe depression, anxiety. It was just like, I don’t even like going out of my house. It was the only time I would leave the grocery store, and what was the reason for going to the gym? But it’s looking into those things and saying, how could we be able to win? Let’s win and it’s counting it, it’s diving deep into yourself, it’s healing the trauma. It’s talking about things. People don’t want to, it’s unfiltered. And that’s what I love doing there.
Scott DeLuzio 00:47:10 Yeah, absolutely. It’s been a pleasure talking to you today, finding out more about how to get back on, on, on the right track or finding, discovering our, our, our path that we need to be on. Where can people go to, find your podcast and listen to that, subscribe to it, and everything else that you might be doing?
Aludas Havens 00:47:35 Absolutely brother. You can go to Apple podcast, Spotify, you’ll put in there, the Winners Paradigm Podcast it’ll pop up. Then the website is the WinnersParadigm.xyz, if you want to be able to join a community that is a free community, excuse me, podcasters who are elite alphas that are working on bettering themselves, monetizing networking. You’ll be able to click on the link there. It’s called alpha podcasters.
Scott DeLuzio 00:48:01 Oh, awesome. Yeah. I’ll have links to all of that in the show notes as well. Anyone who’s looking to check it out when I subscribe to it and listen to some of the episodes, go ahead, check out the show notes and you’ll be able to find all of that stuff right in there. Thank you again. Linda’s for coming on the podcast, sharing your story, your background, and what it is that you do to go out and help people., I really appreciate it.
Aludas Havens 00:48:30 I appreciate you as well, Scott, thank you again, brother.
Scott DeLuzio 00:48:33 Thanks for listening to the Drive On Podcast. If you want to check out more episodes or learn more about the show, you can visit our website DriveOnPodcast.com. We’re also on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube at Drive On Podcast.