139: What I’ve Learned From a Loyal Friend with BPN Director of Communications, Trey Freeman

I sit down with one of my closest friends and BPN’s Director of Communications, Trey Freeman, to reflect on five and a half years of building BPN side-by-side. We dig into the real challenges of balancing work, faith, and family—Trey opens up about his leap of faith to Austin, seasons of freelancing, heartbreaking miscarriages, and the strength he’s found through it all. This episode is a raw look at personal growth, the grit of building a high-performing team, and how an unshakable foundation of faith fuels life and business. ORDER MY BOOK HERE: https://www.amazon.com/Go-One-More-Intentional-Life-Changing/dp/1637746210 FOLLOW: Become a BPN member FOR FREE - Unlock 20% off FOR LIFE https://bpn.team/member IG: instagram.com/nickbarefitness/ YT: youtube.com/@nickbarefitness

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:05Nick Bare?

  Okay, today on the podcast, we have my great friend, my brother, Trey Freeman.

• 0:12Speaker 01

  Thanks for having me. This is, this is special. This is crazy, honestly.

• 0:16Nick Bare?

  Well, why do you say it's special?

• 0:18Speaker 01

  Cause you know, I never like anticipate being on things like this. So, you know, I, I just view it as an honor and a privilege. So, and I know we'll just have fun.

• 0:27Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 0:28Speaker 01

  It's gonna be great.

• 0:29Nick Bare?

  I mean, that's, that's how I've started to really view this, this podcast and this platform. I wanna have conversations with people I genuinely wanna have conversations with.

• 0:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:43Nick Bare?

  I don't want this podcast to be this platform where it's, this person was on this podcast and they jump from the next podcast, the next podcast, and it's the same conversations over and over again.

• 0:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:55Nick Bare?

  I wanna have conversations that I'm genuinely curious and interested in. And you're one of my best friends. We've been doing life together for the last five, six years.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  Long time.

• 1:07Nick Bare?

  And there's a lot to, to talk about.

• 1:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11Nick Bare?

  But before we, we dive into some of this stuff,

• 1:15Nick Bare?

  you know, I, I shared the notes with you.

• 1:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:17Nick Bare?

  That I put together.

• 1:20Nick Bare?

  I started wearing a sleep mask at night.

• 1:23Speaker 01

  Yeah. Like an eye mask.

• 1:25Nick Bare?

  An eye mask over the last couple of days. And Steph makes fun of me, but she said that you were a sleep mask, an eye mask.

• 1:34Speaker 01

  So I used to.

• 1:35Nick Bare?

  Okay.

• 1:35Speaker 01

  When Pearl, before Pearl was born, Phoebe would make fun of me all the time. Cause I had like two eye masks. One of them was like, you remember weighted blankets?

• 1:43Nick Bare?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, I had a weighted blanket. And Phoebe was like, you're like, like, are you okay? Cause I would wear uh, an eye mask and I would do the weighted blanket and I wouldn't use like the other blanket. But then Pearl was born and I stopped using it probably like a few months afterwards for obvious reasons. We just weren't sleeping a lot. But yeah, I had like an eye mask that was weighted and it was like, smelled like lavender.

• 2:07Nick Bare?

  Hmm.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I used to use that one. And then I had one where like, uh, the mask didn't touch your eyes. So you could like still blink.

• 2:15Nick Bare?

  That's, I have one like that right now.

• 2:17Speaker 01

  So I used to use that, but then, you know, two kids later, I'm like,

• 2:22Speaker 01

  No, but it's funny enough like two weeks ago, I was like, I should start wearing my sleep mask because I saw Phoebe's, which is funny because she made fun of me for so long. But then she ended up ordering a bunch of these like silk ones. So, yeah.

• 2:36Nick Bare?

  Some of the things I've done recently, because I started prioritizing sleep.

• 2:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, like, like when? I should know this, but when?

• 2:44Nick Bare?

  Well, today is Tuesday. I started Friday. But I'm, I'm committed.

• 2:50Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 2:50Nick Bare?

  To prioritizing sleep.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  So what does that look like? Besides sleeping big sleep?

• 2:57Nick Bare?

  So it's, it's, it's a lot of stuff. I'll dive into it here. Um, but for some background in context, I'd say for the last 10 years of my life, I have not prioritized sleep. I have prioritized everything above sleep. And I think like, you can relate to this, we're in a very similar

• 3:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:19Nick Bare?

  season of life where our daughters are both three years old. Our son's around one year old. We're married and sleep just gets interrupted frequently. And waking up at 4am every single morning to go knock out a workout and get caught up on work before the day gets started.

• 3:44Nick Bare?

  It used to be a whole lot, I don't want to say easier.

• 3:46Speaker 01

  It was.

• 3:47Nick Bare?

  It was.

• 3:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:48Nick Bare?

  And more consistent.

• 3:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:50Nick Bare?

  But now sleep becomes more broken, especially with a one year old son. And I, I just found myself burying myself with a lack of sleep. And I have brain fog and fatigue down the day and just struggling to get through. And I finally was like, you know what? I'm gonna make a change. I'm commit, gonna commit to prioritizing sleep.

• 4:13Speaker 01

  So is the schedule changed? Like your 4:45?

• 4:16Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 4:16Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 4:17Nick Bare?

  So now I, I try to be in bed by 9pm.

• 4:21Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 4:21Nick Bare?

  9:30pm at the latest. Obviously there's days where it's not gonna happen.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  Tell me.

• 4:26Nick Bare?

  But I have this wind down period at night where I'm not looking at devices or screens. I put on my my blue light blocking glasses. I get into bed, compression boots, I start reading, take peak sleep, wind down. Uh, we have a an eight sleep on our bed, so it cools the temperature.

• 4:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:47Nick Bare?

  Which I highly recommend.

• 4:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 4:48Nick Bare?

  Highly recommend.

• 4:49Speaker 01

  Didn't you have the chili pad?

• 4:50Nick Bare?

  We had the chili pad, then we we uh went over to the eight sleep.

• 4:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:55Nick Bare?

  That's the biggest game changer, you know, cools your bed to like the appropriate temperature. And then I put on my my eye mask. Uh, a few nights I've been mouth taping.

• 5:08Speaker 01

  Okay, how's that? That's the one thing I haven't done.

• 5:11Nick Bare?

  Uh, it it's good, like sometimes in the middle of the night I'll wake up and I'm like, what's going on? And I rip the the mouth tape off. Um, but I I'm trying to get at least seven to eight hours of sleep a night.

• 5:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:28Nick Bare?

  Wake up time now is at six AM. And.

• 5:32Speaker 01

  Every day?

• 5:33Nick Bare?

  Every day.

• 5:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a huge shift.

• 5:35Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 5:36Speaker 01

  I mean, since I've known you, you've woken up at four forty five or earlier.

• 5:40Nick Bare?

  Yeah. So it's it's a big, me and Steph are trying to wake up together at the same time.

• 5:45Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 5:45Nick Bare?

  Building my morning routine, uh, obviously adjusting shifts and things around. But I don't want to keep burying myself in creating this sleep deficit. So now I'm prioritizing sleep for the first time in forever and just from doing that the last couple of days, I feel great.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:06Nick Bare?

  But the the eye mask, dude, I'm obsessed with it.

• 6:10Speaker 01

  It's so great. You I'm gonna have to use mine again. I sleep's tough. It is really tough. I think anyone with kids could say it's really tough. Yeah. I know that my like, yeah, the when Phoebe was gone last week in Italy, she was like, I feel great. Do you think there's something wrong with our house? Uh, do we have mold? I'm like, no, you're just not getting. Woken up by two kids like multiple times in the middle of the night.

• 6:32Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:34Nick Bare?

  It's funny you say that and that Phoebe says that because I've had that thought before with Steph. But do you think we have a black mold in our, our home that we're, we're always fatigued and tired? And I by no means want this to come across as complaining.

• 6:49Speaker 01

  No.

• 6:50Nick Bare?

  But it's just just being real about the, the season.

• 6:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:53Nick Bare?

  Of life that we're in that sleep gets disrupted. You know, our, our daughters just started school again.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:01Nick Bare?

  Two weeks ago. And everyone always told me when kids start school, they bring home all these sicknesses. And I didn't understand it until it happened week one.

• 7:11Speaker 01

  Now you, now you do.

• 7:13Nick Bare?

  Oh my gosh.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, my Otto, my youngest and then Phoebe were sick this weekend. Pearl was sick last week, so hopefully we made it. We make it on the other side after this week.

• 7:24Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 7:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. At least until Christmas.

• 7:26Nick Bare?

  How much, how much sleep are you getting tonight?

• 7:28Speaker 01

  Um.

• 7:28Nick Bare?

  What, what do you try to get?

• 7:30Speaker 01

  I try to get at least six and a half, which is like, I know not ideal. I think what is really hard and we've had conversations about this. Um, and I think the type of, a lot of people that probably listen to the podcast and the people that are in the office, like, I wake up early, I spend time reading my Bible, I work out and then I come here and when I get home, I'm just focused on my kids. Uh, having a good time with them, doing dinner together. And then once the kids go down, which I think there's seasons of change through the routine. Like right now, we're in a good spot where the kids just now started going down like pretty, pretty quick. I mean, we've talked for like, there was times where Pearl, it would take her like an hour and a half. And then it's nine thirty and my house is a wreck. I've barely eaten dinner.

• 8:15Speaker 01

  And then, you know, you blink and it's ten, 10, 11 PM. So right now the kids are going down earlier. So me and Phoebe are spending more time together. We're trying to just, you know, have conversations.

• 8:26Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  Again, now that we're out of the newborn stage, we're in a routine and then clean the house and just get in bed and then just do it all over again. But like you said, some days it's just not possible. I think the, the hard part that I struggle with is when I get to the end of the day, after the house is cleaned and the kids are down, I just want to decompress. Or I want to like work on something that I want to do or like read a book or something. And then the inevitable happens and I blink and it's 11 PM.

• 8:51Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Which I don't really know what to do with that besides like put off.

• 8:57Speaker 01

  Reading or decompressing, but that's also why I wake up early is because no one else is awake. Um, so I tried to shoot for six and a half, seven, but recently I've been like, I need to get more sleep. But of course, when I'm like, I need to get more sleep, both my kids are sick.

• 9:10Nick Bare?

  Right.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  Like this morning, uh, Otto was up at, or Pearl woke me up at three and then Otto woke me up at five. I'm like, this is great, but no, again, not complaining. It's just the reality of being a parent.

• 9:21Nick Bare?

  It's just, it's just the, yeah, the season of life.

• 9:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. And the thing is the seasonal go away.

• 9:26Nick Bare?

  Right.

• 9:26Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, it did with, with Pearl and it will with the, our youngest again. So.

• 9:32Nick Bare?

  Yeah. One of the things I think about often is that we pride ourselves in being high performers. I think a lot of people that we work with, the space that we're in, it's all about performance. And optimization and efficiency and getting all these things done. And I've always, I don't say always, but for a long time I've been that way.

• 9:54Nick Bare?

  But I don't know why I, I was so resistant to prioritizing sleep. Because I now, for some reason, recognize if I actually want to be a high performer, the highest performer possible.

• 10:10Nick Bare?

  Then I have to get rest. I have to have this recovery. I have to decompress and it's not selfish. And it's not being lazy, but it's if I want to do these things at my greatest capacity. You gotta build in this time of, of rest and recovery. So one of the other changes I made recently is that when I get home from work. I have like a re-acclimation period, which is 15 to 20 minutes.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:39Nick Bare?

  And the way I spend it is I go into the sauna, cold plunge. I put my phone in a drawer.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:46Nick Bare?

  And that the phone stays in the drawer until, uh, right before I go to bed, right before I go to bed. I check it one last time for messages and slacks and emails, set my, uh, alarm. And then put it away, go to sleep. The way it looks different is I would have my phone on me from the moment I got home from work until I went to sleep and I'm responding to text messages and slacks and emails and all these things and I wasn't actually present in the way that I wanted to be present and I was still on the clock.

• 11:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:21Nick Bare?

  So I'm not forcing myself to be off the clock when I get home. That's then family time.

• 11:25Speaker 01

  Not not having a phone on you when you get home because I've done the same thing for the last like probably six months now. When I get home, uh, when I park in the driveway, I'll sit there for like two, three minutes unless the kids are outside and I'll put my phone in my glove box and then I just go inside. And I feel like I've noticed the biggest difference in like connecting with my kids and my family by just literally the simple act of not bringing my phone in the house.

• 11:52Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 11:52Speaker 01

  And even like not sleeping with it. I did that after Pearl was probably six months old. I would put my phone, I would like charge it downstairs and just use my watch or like we have one of those hatch alarm clocks, the one that like has the, the sunrise.

• 12:07Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  Uh, light and I just use that. And then when Otto was born, it's been tough because you're just like, when, when a newborn awakes for the middle of the night, you're just like fighting for your life to stay awake. And the easiest way to stay awake is looking at your phone.

• 12:17Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  Um, but I've, I've noticed a significant difference in my ability to be present and connect with like my family by just leaving my phone in my car and it's really not that difficult.

• 12:29Nick Bare?

  I'm reading, um, The Intentional Father right now by John Tyson.

• 12:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:35Nick Bare?

  Which I'm really enjoying. It's been recommended to me so many times over the last couple of years. I just never picked it up and now that I'm picking it up, the, the foundation of it is being an intentional father. And you, I've realized and I've learned like you can't be intentional if you're still distracted by the things you're not willing to let go.

• 13:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:00Nick Bare?

  And for me, for the longest time was my phone. I felt like I had to be accessible at all times and.

• 13:09Nick Bare?

  I've just come to the realization that nothing is that important. There's exceptions.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:16Nick Bare?

  And I can't wait until the next day of the morning. While I'm with my family at night, I have to be present. I have to be intentional. I want to be there.

• 13:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, especially when life happens, you realize like there's nothing more important than your family.

• 13:30Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 13:31Speaker 01

  Like when your kids get sick, you're like, I always feel so bad when my kids get sick. Obviously I feel bad, but because I see the joy that they normally have and it's not there. And yeah, every time one of the kids gets sick or like Phoebe's sick, I'm like, nothing's more important than my family.

• 13:46Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 13:47Speaker 01

  You can always wait. Not that work's not important. I believe what we're doing. And what a lot of people are doing is really important, but it's when it becomes the number one thing in your life. And then you're deprioritized everything else. We've both done that over the years. It's hard not to. I think it'll probably be a battle that we face for a long time. But yeah, nothing's more important than your family.

• 14:11Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:12Nick Bare?

  Did you ever have a problem

• 14:16Nick Bare?

  making your identity work? And if so, what facilitated a change or a shift to reprioritize? Cause what I what I found is I've been here myself.

• 14:31Nick Bare?

  It's really easy to list out your priorities in order of importance in life. You can say God is number one, family a second, and then self. But then when you go to plan your calendar, your week, your month, you put self first.

• 14:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:47Nick Bare?

  And then you put family stuff. And then if there's time left over, you put time for God. How do you

• 14:57Nick Bare?

  view or approach identity?

• 15:01Speaker 01

  It's really hard. And yeah, I have, I have absolutely made my career my identity before. And it's tough because I think the vast majority of the world, that's like, what everyone struggles with because they're, everyone to some degree wants to be successful, I think for the most part. And, you know, in the lives that we live, you know, following, following Jesus, what you realize is the only true place that your identity can be found is found in Jesus, right? You have a God-sized hole in your heart that only God can fill. But the issue is, no matter what, over time, when we drift away from that reality and that truth,

• 15:45Speaker 01

  we try to fill the God-sized hole of other things. And yeah, I've absolutely done it. Even in the time when I've been following Jesus, through the years here, I've made it my identity. And what that comes about or comes out like is, this now is the priority. And looking back, like, of course hindsight is 2020, but I could look back and see through the years where I did place a higher priority on work, thinking that it was the betterment of my family. And I think that's a trap a lot of people fall into is, you think, we think building the career and the success is gonna be the primary benefit that like keeps my family like happy and at peace.

• 16:31Speaker 01

  And the reality is like, it's not true. Yes, we need to work hard and steward the opportunity. Like I absolutely, wake up every day, I'm like, I need to steward the opportunity to have a BP. Because I know it can all end in a flash. But it should never take the place of that my identity is found in God and God alone. And when I'm secure in that, then I can show up here and be the best version of myself. Right. Yeah, but I have, I have absolutely showed up here where this is, I've gone months and probably years where

• 17:04Speaker 01

  My career, especially even when I was doing freelance photography, where it's like, everything that we were trying to do like hinged on my ability to like, make money and pay our bills. And then coming here, we were just building so fast where it's so easy to make this place everything. It's so easy for anyone to make their career their everything. And it's really tangible, right? You can see the growth, you can see the success, or you can see the failures and

• 17:31Nick Bare?

  You can measure it.

• 17:32Speaker 01

  You can measure it so much. So it's super easy to attach yourself to that because if it's growing, there's an innate part of you that feels like, oh, I'm being successful, which in in reality, we are being successful as things grow. But

• 17:47Speaker 01

  when things are going to be successful, the question is, am I getting validation from that? Like, is my security in who I am directly tied to what I'm doing or who I am? And I think that's the biggest struggle that I think anyone who's like a high, high achiever like we are, like you are,

• 18:10Speaker 01

  is I've put

• 18:12Speaker 01

  the priority on what I'm doing and not who I am.

• 18:14Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 18:16Nick Bare?

  You said validation. I think that is like such a a key word to focus on right now.

• 18:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:27Nick Bare?

  You know, I want to say before I dive into this, I'm not saying that work shouldn't be any less important. I'm not saying that BPN is any less important to me now than it was prior to.

• 18:43Nick Bare?

  I made this post a few days ago on Instagram and it said,

• 18:50Nick Bare?

  God, family, then everything else, in that order.

• 18:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:55Nick Bare?

  I actually got a lot of pushback. People sent me messages saying, there's no way you can tell me that anything matters more to me than my daughter or my wife or my family. And I used to believe this as well. But what I've come to learn is that if I don't put God first, then I'm not showing up for my family and I'm not showing up for myself and all other things.

• 19:23Nick Bare?

  In the right way. I'm not honoring them. I'm not honoring or being intentional in the way that I want to lead and raise my children in my family and show up for my work. So it has to be in that order.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:37Nick Bare?

  And I myself used to put things in order of priority in my life that were self-serving at the at the the tip of the spear, if you will. Because it was measurable and I received validation. If the business was growing and that was measurable and I could open up my Shopify app and see sales growing and we could look at the P and L and see profitability increasing. I could see YouTube video views skyrocketing and social growth improving.

• 20:21Nick Bare?

  That for me was I'm doing the right thing. I am successful.

• 20:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:26Nick Bare?

  If you will. There's other parts of our life that you're not getting this immediate feedback and validation and it's not measurable. And sometimes it's really easy to say, well, I will put those in second, third, fourth place because I don't get the feedback or the fulfillment in them. Because it's it's more subjective than objective. It's really easy to place priority on these things in our life that are objectively measured than those that are not. And I think when you start chasing the objectively measured to determine and define your success,

• 21:06Nick Bare?

  that becomes a habit that can potentially become destructive and dangerous.

• 21:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I think, would you say like?

• 21:17Speaker 01

  The insecurities come out.

• 21:19Nick Bare?

  A hundred percent.

• 21:20Speaker 01

  Like that's.

• 21:20Nick Bare?

  One hundred percent.

• 21:21Speaker 01

  That's when I can like pick up on it is when my insecurities are now the driver. Like I don't, I've, I've, my confidence in not, is not in who I am anymore. I'm being driven by like fear or success and success, meaning like worldly success. What we would define as like, just like business success, which again, success is good. But when it's driving everything, it, it's like a wildfire. It can be a wildfire in your life because it can be all consuming, just like anything else. Like if you put anything at the top like that, you can, you can have it burn through everything in your life. But yeah, that's like the number one thing is insecurities start to come to the surface.

• 22:05Speaker 01

  And I'll be insecure towards myself, but also then I'll start to project it out onto other people.

• 22:11Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 22:11Speaker 01

  Uh, and that's like, I'm like, okay, I need to like, take a step back. What's going on? What, like where am I out of order in these priorities?

• 22:22Nick Bare?

  And insecurity is driven by fear.

• 22:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:25Nick Bare?

  Like one of my favorite quotes I heard recently. Uh, and it was a podcast I was listening to about masculinity and manhood. But as I share it, I don't want people to view it as gender specific.

• 22:41Nick Bare?

  Strong men fear God. And they don't fear man. Weak men fear man too much and God too little.

• 22:53Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 22:53Nick Bare?

  And if you put your fear into God as opposed to man or other people, you'll be led into the right way on the correct path, doing great things. But if you put all that fear into other individuals, which creates insecurity, that's dangerous.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  It's because people are flawed, like we're all flawed, like we are all to some degree broken. I don't know, there is not a single person in the world that's not broken. So when you put all your hope and your security in people, you will quickly find out that people are broken. Like, and I think that's one of the biggest issues and the challenges that like people face and we face following Jesus is Jesus is the only perfect person that ever lived and will ever live. So when you put your confidence and your hope in Him, He is an anchor for your soul that cannot be shaken, right? But when you put that anchor, you take the anchor up and you put it and you

• 23:58Speaker 01

  anchor it to someone that is not Jesus, you realize eventually that that person is equally as broken as you are. And that's not to their fault, it's not to your fault, it's just human nature that we look for security in people. And when we take our, what you were saying, we place our eyes on success and we don't fear God, we don't have a reverence for Him, and we begin to be led by man. Well, man is broken, we're broken. So how can we find security in broken people, right?

• 24:38Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 24:39Speaker 01

  So that's, yeah, it's tough.

• 24:42Nick Bare?

  So how do you use social media personally?

• 24:44Speaker 01

  Me?

• 24:44Nick Bare?

  Yeah, how do you consume content, you know, outside of the way that you use it for BPN?

• 24:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:53Nick Bare?

  Because I think, I think social media as a whole is a huge distraction, in many, many ways and many reasons. And I think it actually creates more insecurity and weakness than it does strength and confidence.

• 25:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's interesting because I run BPN Social. So usually by the end of the day, I don't want to be on social because I've been on social all day at work. But how I use it is really just a creative outlet right now for BPN. I don't really use it for anything else. I'll randomly use it to connect with people, like reach out to so and so. Maybe they've done something that I thought was very inspiring, but I don't. Actually use it a ton. I'm probably in the outlier category of social. But I will say it is a huge distraction and I've gone through phases where

• 25:45Speaker 01

  I've deleted my account from my phone on Instagram. So the only one that's on there is BPN. And you quickly realize, or I quickly realized, man, I'm far less insecure and judgmental. When I'm not on it. And I, again, I think there's so many great things about social media, but for me personally, I don't find a huge value in it. That's like above and beyond things that I could find value elsewhere, right?

• 26:16Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 26:17Speaker 01

  I do think it's really powerful and I think it's really good. And I think there's there's a place where goodness and light needs to be spread through social media. And I think there's people probably like yourself and like Chad and other people that we know. And the churches that we attend that need to be on social media because you're a light in darkness. I don't necessarily feel like I need to be that person on social media. I've never felt like I need to be like on social a ton. Yeah, that's how I use it, which is more so or less for creative, for BPN. Just looking for inspiration. And then outside of that, honestly, I just try to stay off of it so that I'm

• 26:54Speaker 01

  not insecure judgmental.

• 26:57Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I'm starting to view social media truly as an upload and creative platform and not a consumer platform, for me at least.

• 27:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. Now YouTube, I do view YouTube a little differently because there's, there's just things I like, like I like camping, so I watch camping videos.

• 27:16Nick Bare?

  I think YouTube can be more of a, like a resource and a tool.

• 27:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's the doom scrolling thing. Like, we've talked about it, like right before Otto was born, I felt like everything I saw on Instagram was like not good things about pregnancy. I'm like, I gotta get off this thing.

• 27:32Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  So, yeah.

• 27:34Nick Bare?

  Do you guys ever talk about how you envision your kids using social media?

• 27:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, we do. We probably, maybe it's not as unpopular, but.

• 27:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, the kids won't have social. It's just, they just won't, they won't have phones. When they get to high school,

• 27:56Speaker 01

  in the right scenario, yeah, we'll give them a phone, but yeah, they're even current currently outside of like, we are driving somewhere far and we are in critical meltdown, like absolutely, there's no solution and it's usually our fault. We've like stayed out too late somewhere. Then, you know, maybe like a two minute video to get them to like come back down to earth.

• 28:19Nick Bare?

  Right.

• 28:19Speaker 01

  But the kids aren't allowed to use our phones even presently. Um, yeah, we're very much like, we've seen what social media and phones have done to our lives. And my wife was a nanny for, Phoebe was a nanny for five years. So she got to kind of see it firsthand and like the that five to 10 year old range and

• 28:43Speaker 01

  I think there's probably a lot more damage being done than people realize. So yeah, we've, we've more or less took the stance of no phones. When you're older, sure, but before high school, no shot.

• 28:57Nick Bare?

  Yeah, we talk about it a lot. I would love, and I know there's probably parents listening to this of older kids, like, yeah, good luck. But my goal as a leader of my family is that in a way that I, I teach my children and mentor them and lead them.

• 29:17Nick Bare?

  They get to a point where I don't have to say, hey, you don't, you don't get access to social media, this technology, these phones. They say, I don't want to use that stuff.

• 29:27Speaker 01

  I don't need it.

• 29:28Nick Bare?

  I don't need it. I want to stay off of it.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:30Nick Bare?

  That for me would be a huge, under the table.

• 29:34Speaker 01

  Yes. Yeah. I mean, and if people want to give their kids phones, like I'm totally like, you do whatever. This is just for my family.

• 29:40Nick Bare?

  Right.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:41Nick Bare?

  To, to each their own.

• 29:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 29:44Nick Bare?

  I, I, I'm, I'm in the same boat where like, I'm not ever going to tell anyone else how to raise their kids. But I think of how do I want to raise my children and what do I have to start doing now? You know, the girls are in school now and I've had this, this recent.

• 30:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:03Nick Bare?

  Realization that we are no longer just trying to keep these children alive. We are now leading these children.

• 30:09Speaker 01

  They do what we do.

• 30:11Nick Bare?

  Yes.

• 30:12Speaker 01

  Crazy.

• 30:13Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  And like anyone who has kids that are older, like, well, yeah, like, well, I just got there. Like Pearl repeats what I say, like, the good and the bad.

• 30:24Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 30:24Speaker 01

  It's super scary. It's like intimidating and but also the other, the other side of it, which is like so sweet and powerful. It's like, I can see.

• 30:34Speaker 01

  When me and Phoebe are consistent, consistent in the things that we value the most. Pearl begins to value them as well. Now, value in a different way, like she knows on Sunday, we go to church and she loves it. Like, she never, yeah, when she was little, yeah, of course she's gonna like not love going into Sunday school. Because one kid loves going into Sunday school at first, or like, what is this room? Who is this person? But now, you know, she's got friends, she goes to Sunday school with Charlie, those type of things. But even like working out, like Pearl's now to the age where if I work out on the weekends in the garage, she'll come out there with me.

• 31:11Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 31:11Speaker 01

  She does her like squats. Um, and those are the things I love and she knows like where my Bible is. But inversely, she, I've heard her make comments of like.

• 31:24Speaker 01

  Or daddy, are you looking at your phone? Just stab you in the heart, man. I'm like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna throw it away. Yeah, honestly, if I didn't run VPN social and work, work for VPN in a creative capacity, I would probably get rid of it. Um, but yeah, it's, it's super scary. Went from, I think you talked about on the last podcast, we went from keeping kids alive and like taking care of them in a, you know, nurturing, providing way to like, we're in a molding phase now.

• 31:52Nick Bare?

  Yeah. It's a huge responsibility.

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Huge. It's because it'll be in, in part who they are for the rest of their life. But also what I've realized is so much of how we view God is in part of how we view our parents. And that's tough. As I've become a dad, like, part of Pearl's interpretation of God will be how I treat her. Now, that's scary. Obviously, God is able to like rewire and correct anything because I'm a broken person that I do wrong as a parent. But ultimately, I know that I will have an impact on how she views, she views God.

• 32:36Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I've been telling Charlie recently, "God loves you." She's like, "Who?" She's like, "I don't love him." I was like, "You will one day when you understand." I was like, "Charlie, the Holy Spirit is within you." She's like, "Get it out. Get it out."

• 32:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:53Nick Bare?

  Like, "One day, you will appreciate this." So I'm trying to lay that foundation now as she's like, learning and developing and trying to comprehend. But something you said that I believe is, is very important and valuable is, our kids learn a lot by watching us, and especially our marriage in the way that we, as husband and wife, partners, treat each other. Like, what do you and Phoebe do in your marriage, in this crazy season of life, where you're building a professional career, you guys are raising two young kids, life is busy? And what have you guys done

• 33:37Nick Bare?

  intentionally to show your, your kids that marriage is a priority?

• 33:47Speaker 01

  I think we're still trying to figure it out to some degree. I think there's It's valid, it's valid. Yeah, I think there's, there are things that we've made like intentional decisions that are now common, so I don't think about them as much, like dinners. We're always gonna eat dinner as a family, whether dinner is, I make dinner and we bring it all out into the backyard and we just, the kids are playing or outside, or we're sitting at the table, or we go in the front yard. We put an emphasis on dinner and put emphasis on no phones. I know that sounds like, you know, I've already talked about it, but that's like a big thing for us is, once I get home, really being disconnected from that. And then

• 34:30Speaker 01

  I think there are some things that we've tried to do for each other to make sure that we, we as a married couple are still healthy. So for the most part, when I get home, if Phoebe wants to go to the gym, she absolutely can go to the gym. Hmm, she, Phoebe's a stay-at-home mom, so she's been with the kids all day. So I try to give her the space and time to go work out and have time for herself so that she can be the best version of herself, because fitness matters to our family. So I don't, I don't know if we have all like a list of intentional things that we're doing, but like family dinners, spending time together, me keeping my phone and my backpack in my car.

• 35:14Speaker 01

  Now, I used to get really nervous because I would always think like, what if somebody comes and gets my backpack? Because I keep all of our hard drives. My photo hard drive is in there, so I get a little nervous, but we live in Georgetown, Texas. No one's coming to my driveway and taking my bag out. But yeah, leave my bag, my phone, in my car after work. I'll get it after the kids go down. And then just being present with the kids, like having fun, making dinner, um, not being overly rigid about their routines, like.

• 35:46Speaker 01

  You know, seize the moment with them. Like, go to the park. Have ice cream every once in a while. Let's go to Killens. Um, yeah, I would say those are the type of things and then making sure that we are creating space for us to care for each other and allow us to still be the priority. I think that's one thing that's really hard when you have kids that I learned from mentors over the years is you, our kids and it could be not received well, what I'm about to say. My kids are a part of my marriage. I am not a, like, my world doesn't revolve around them. They revolve around my world. Like, me and Phoebe are still the priority.

• 36:27Speaker 01

  And if we're not taking care of ourselves in our marriage, well, guess what? Our kids are not going to be taken care of as well. It's kind of what we talked about earlier was like, you know, when you put God at the top and then you take care of your marriage, like, it sounds out of order because then your kids are there. What we've learned is when God is at the top and we take care of our marriage, our kids are getting the best version of ourselves. Like, they just are. Because at the end of the day, when our kids are grown up and they leave and they go to college, what's left? Me and Phoebe, you and Steph. Like, our marriage is still foundational to the kids, to the world that we're raising with our kids. So the kids are part of our world. And yes, we do things for them, but like,

• 37:11Speaker 01

  my entire existence doesn't revolve around just them. You're a part of my world and our marriage that we brought you into and we love you so much, always going to care for you. But I'm not gonna sacrifice my marriage on that. Does that make sense?

• 37:26Nick Bare?

  I absolutely agree.

• 37:28Speaker 01

  So.

• 37:29Nick Bare?

  I think it's one of those things that is

• 37:32Nick Bare?

  this, I'm speaking from personal experience, so much easier said than done.

• 37:35Speaker 01

  So much easier.

• 37:37Nick Bare?

  Where it's in the past, and this is really what I'm trying to work on in my life for now, in my family's life. Say, okay, I'm gonna get this, this business stuff taken care of, my work, because that's what my family needs and values. That's what I thought.

• 37:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:56Nick Bare?

  And then I'm gonna come home from a crazy day at work, I'm gonna prioritize the kids. And then whatever is left over, me and Steph can have our time.

• 38:10Nick Bare?

  Which rarely ever happen. So I, I, I do believe that it's God first, that lays the foundation.

• 38:19Nick Bare?

  And then it's prioritizing marriage, and then it is everything else.

• 38:23Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 38:25Nick Bare?

  And one of the, the ways that I think about that is, I want my kids, growing up, to watch me and Steph love each other.

• 38:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:35Nick Bare?

  You know, I, I watched my parents growing up. They, they always had the spark, like, we'd be prepping dinner and my, like, dad would come to my mom and start kissing her. I'm like, stop.

• 38:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:47Nick Bare?

  Stop, stop, stop. But now looking back, I'm like, oh, my, my parents.

• 38:52Speaker 01

  They were in love.

• 38:53Nick Bare?

  They were in love and

• 38:56Nick Bare?

  even after decades, they didn't lose that and they showed us that. And that taught me so much. And I want my kids to see that same thing. So sometimes as tired as I am at the end of the day, and we're all around together, I'm like, okay, I, I need to love on Steph. I need to prioritize her and I want my kids to see what loving on your partner looks like.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:21Nick Bare?

  That's one of the ways that I've tried to be more intentional recently.

• 39:26Nick Bare?

  Because your kids will listen to what you say, but more importantly, they're gonna watch what you do. And they're gonna emulate that, especially as they get older.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  How, so you're, you're for sure one of the most consistent people I've ever met in my life. I think anyone online could probably say that, but like, I've lived a life with you now for going on six years and you are so consistent with everything that you're determined to set your mind to. Now that you've, you know, been following Jesus now and you're making these shifts, right?

• 39:57Speaker 01

  Have you found, has the shifts in your consistency to like break what was been difficult? Does that make sense? Like you're so consistent with like the 445.

• 40:08Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:09Speaker 01

  Making the shifts now, has it been difficult to like create new consistencies?

• 40:15Nick Bare?

  Um, yes.

• 40:18Nick Bare?

  You know, I have a lot of people in my life who are, who tell me what I want to hear, not what I need to hear. And I have a good friend and mentor, his name's Justin. Uh, we were on a run last week and I was telling him how I've, I've fully surrendered everything to following Jesus.

• 40:38Nick Bare?

  And he said, no, you haven't. You haven't. You're, you're lying to yourself. You say you want to make these changes, but you're, you're, you're not willing to make these changes that you say you're, you're going to. You commit to a lot of things in your life and you're very consistent and the things that are easy and comfortable for you. It is easy and comfortable for me to wake up at 4am every morning to go knock out my run, no matter how tired I am. Because that consistency to my routine and schedule feels really good and striving and accomplishing and achieving. But he's like, in order for you to fully surrender,

• 41:18Nick Bare?

  you need to be able to show up for your family and your work and these people at the best of your ability. That means, that means you need sleep, you need rest, you need recovery. If you're going to fully surrender, you need to break your routine, break everything you know, empty yourself.

• 41:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:33Nick Bare?

  And follow Him.

• 41:36Nick Bare?

  And if you empty yourself and follow Jesus, you will start putting things back in the right order, not for your personal needs, but for what He wants for you to accomplish.

• 41:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. Cause being consistent isn't bad.

• 41:49Nick Bare?

  No.

• 41:50Speaker 01

  No. I'm like a huge advocate of like people that follow Jesus. I'm like, you should be consistent.

• 41:56Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 41:56Speaker 01

  It's the priority thing, right? Yeah, I was just curious like, cause you are so, you've always been so disciplined. So to hear like that, that's probably why my, when you told me six AM, I'm so shocked. It's like shocked in a good way. Because I have watched you sacrifice more than anyone will ever know. Not just me, but like the, the staff here, the people, like there's so much that's happened behind closed doors that no one will really know. So it, it is, I'm excited for you. And also I'm like, I need to get more sleep.

• 42:30Nick Bare?

  It, it's this muscle that when you train it for so long, it's really easy to flex. It is super strong.

• 42:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, I feel like I could easily not sleep.

• 42:39Nick Bare?

  Oh, yeah. That's a, that's a, last night I was telling Steph, I knew today was about to be a, a really busy day. Say, hey, I'm just gonna wake up at four, knock on this run.

• 42:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:51Nick Bare?

  She said, she said, no, you're not.

• 42:52Speaker 01

  You used to do that before you traveled.

• 42:53Nick Bare?

  Yeah. If we were, if we were at a six AM flight, I would wake up at two thirty to go run.

• 42:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:00Nick Bare?

  And I think there's a lot of ego and pride behind that. There's a time and place when you just gotta get it done.

• 43:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:07Nick Bare?

  But when you keep boring yourself.

• 43:11Nick Bare?

  I, I talk with people, I meet people who are so zombied out because they're unwilling to break their consistent routine. Again, a consistent routine is great.

• 43:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:23Nick Bare?

  But when you are boring yourself and it's hurting you, it's hurting your family, it's hurting people around you. You can't think clear, you're fatigued, you're, you're brain fogged. You're not actually there.

• 43:35Speaker 01

  It's so funny, cause you know, God is the God of clarity. I think when we have the right priorities, outside of like, there's practically things where like your kids just wake up. There's just gonna be bad days, but like what you're saying where you're like, you're just brain fogged, nothing. It's like you're striving from a deficit every day. I feel like there, that is a sense of not having clarity because the priorities are not aligned, right?

• 44:02Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 44:03Speaker 01

  When God's at the top, I feel like no matter what happens, you still have clarity. It doesn't mean that days aren't bad and days aren't great, but I have clarity because God is the top priority of my life. And I feel like he provides clarity even when.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  Life is not what you expect or what we expect. You know, God's a God of peace. You know, the Bible says that God provides a peace that surpasses all understanding. That means that on the good days, the bad days, the days that don't make sense, He provides a peace and a clarity that surpasses what you experience on earth. Right? And so I think that like when we talk about the brain fog, like I've experienced that so many times and I realize, again hindsight is 2020. It's because I've not prioritized the main thing. And I feel so challenged sometimes when I'm like, I am so willing to sleep for four hours and go for a five mile run, 10 mile run, track workout. But the question I've been asking myself recently is, am I equally as willing to wake up and read my Bible?

• 45:07Speaker 01

  And there's some days I'm not.

• 45:08Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 45:09Speaker 01

  But I fully believe that if we can give our first part of our day to God,

• 45:16Speaker 01

  He will provide a path for the rest of the day. Not saying that you can't, you can't wake up and run and do all those things. But the challenge that I've been, and the question I've been asking myself is, am I equally as willing to give up sleep and time? Or move a workout at the expense of my soul?

• 45:40Speaker 01

  It's tough.

• 45:41Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I recently heard, what are you willing to let go of so that you can go higher?

• 45:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:48Nick Bare?

  There, there's a ceiling where you can't go any higher because you're not willing to let go of certain things.

• 45:54Nick Bare?

  And for a long time, I was not willing to let go of a lot of things. And something that I keep in mind recently a lot is,

• 46:03Nick Bare?

  God doesn't ask you to sacrifice, but He asks you to be obedient. There's a difference between sacrificing and being obedient. And I I believe I used to view them as the same thing.

• 46:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, and the Bible is really clear about that. In the Old Testament, it talks about, you know, God, God isn't looking for a sacrifice, he's looking for obedience. Because in the Old Testament, they had to bring sacrifice to, uh, you know, have the presence of God come down. Um, and I don't wanna like, I don't wanna quote any scripture, so. But yeah, you're totally right. And I had a mentor of mine for years, he's still a mentor in my life, Brian Cromer, and he, one of the number one things he's taught me, and I, we've talked about it, is in God's kingdom, success equals obedience.

• 46:50Nick Bare?

  Mm-hmm.

• 46:51Speaker 01

  Which is so backwards, because what we've been doing, you would deem as success, which is successful, what we're doing. But when we stack it into God's kingdom, what true success is, is obedience. Obedience is what God's saying.

• 47:05Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I've had a lot of different mindset shifts.

• 47:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:09Nick Bare?

  Lately, that I've just been sitting on one and, and thinking about, and I'm really proud of what we have built up until this point.

• 47:21Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 47:22Nick Bare?

  And what we've accomplished and how we've gotten here. I'm, I'm very proud of that. But I've also reached a point, and I've realized that for this next chapter, it's gonna look a little different, the way that we get there. It has to. And I believe, I have confidence that will continue to bring us success because we are prioritizing the right things, and that we are being obedient to what God wants us to do. And we're pursuing things that we don't just want for ourselves,

• 48:03Nick Bare?

  but because we know that this is what we're asking to do, and how we're asking to do it, and where we're asking to go. And if we follow His will and His word,

• 48:15Nick Bare?

  Success will be multiplied. We will be blessed. But we're not doing it because of the multiplication of success. We're not doing it for the blessing. We're doing it because it is the right thing and because we're being called to be obedient.

• 48:28Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 48:29Nick Bare?

  So that's how I see this next chapter of life looking for us.

• 48:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:36Nick Bare?

  And that brings me so much peace and joy and fulfillment, knowing that hey, we got here by trying to muscle it on our own, or at least me, muscle it on my own. Now, what happens if I surrender?

• 48:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:56Nick Bare?

  And I just focus on obedience? I know that will only lead us to the right place in the right way.

• 49:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, when you follow God, you'll never fail.

• 49:06Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 49:07Speaker 01

  Like, can life be hard? Absolutely. And life will be hard. But if you follow God and you're obedient to what he's asking you to do, you can't fail because God is perfect. Life will be hard, things will happen, and life will be great. But the confidence that we have is that God cannot fail. It's not in his nature to fail us. So when we follow God, literally, nothing can fail. Bad things happen, good things happen, but it doesn't change the overarching truth that God is truth and he cannot fail. So it takes all the pressure off because we're not responsible. We're responsible to steward it and to obey.

• 49:51Speaker 01

  But at the end of the day, if we do those two things, we can rest knowing that it's gonna be good.

• 49:57Nick Bare?

  We were sitting in church like two weeks ago and Pastor Joe was talking about that. And I took like the tithing envelope and I wrote in the back of it and I showed it to staff.

• 50:10Nick Bare?

  We can't lose.

• 50:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:12Nick Bare?

  We can't lose.

• 50:14Speaker 01

  Isn't it a great feeling?

• 50:15Nick Bare?

  Yes. I literally said like that, the people behind me are probably like, what's wrong with that? I was like, we can't lose.

• 50:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:21Nick Bare?

  And it said that, it wrote it on the card. Oh my gosh. You spend so much time in a defensive position trying to hedge all of your vulnerabilities and weaknesses. And when you realize that, like, you surrender that and you just follow this one person, you can't lose.

• 50:48Nick Bare?

  You're, you're on offense now.

• 50:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. And now you, you probably fully understand now why

• 50:56Speaker 01

  you so badly want other people to know.

• 50:59Nick Bare?

  And that's why, that's why I want to share what I've experienced.

• 51:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, you've, you've, you've seen and tasted the other side, right? And you've seen the worst of life. And now through Jesus, you've seen what true joy and true happiness is. And I know at least for me, like, I just don't want anyone to miss out on that. Like, I want people to feel the peace that surpasses all understanding. I want them to feel the joy that is irreplaceable, that'll never run dry. Cause there's a lot of hurting people out there. And man, there's a joy that can absolutely save your life.

• 51:39Nick Bare?

  It's even shifted the way that I

• 51:44Nick Bare?

  consume content in terms of books, podcasts, audiobooks. Like, you know me, for the last 10 years, I have listened to or read every self-help book, every self-help podcast imaginable. I've listened to all of them, all of them. And

• 52:09Nick Bare?

  From a strategy and tactic standpoint, they have definitely helped me.

• 52:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:14Nick Bare?

  They have definitely helped me get to where I am today. I'm very grateful for the content that's been created by many people. But that's all they are is transactional strategy and tactics. And they work for a period of time. And then they don't. And then you're constantly searching for what's the next self-help book?

• 52:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:35Nick Bare?

  What's the next self-help podcast? What's this this unlock that I haven't experienced or found yet? What's that? Where's that key at that someone has?

• 52:47Nick Bare?

  And you see all the marketing behind all of these materials. It's this is what's missing in your life. And you consume it, you read it, you listen to it. You think it's the answer, you apply it, it works for a period of time, and then it doesn't. And you're searching for the next thing.

• 53:04Nick Bare?

  And now I've found that one thing. I've found the key. I found the truth. So I don't need all those other things.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:12Nick Bare?

  Again, they have they have gotten to this point. I'm so grateful for.

• 53:15Speaker 01

  And they're great tools.

• 53:15Nick Bare?

  They're great tools.

• 53:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:17Nick Bare?

  But that's all they are is tools.

• 53:18Speaker 01

  Tools. Yeah. They're not the foundation.

• 53:21Nick Bare?

  No.

• 53:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, the Bible talks about you. There's, I believe it's in Matthew, it talks about building your life on the rock of Jesus. So that when the winds and the storms come, if a house is built on the sand, when the winds and storms come, the house will fall. But a house that's built on the rock of Jesus, the foundation of God, it cannot be shaken. You've now found the foundation, right? So you're building your life and your house on a foundation that regardless of the storms of life and the realities of what happens to us, it cannot be shaken versus when our life was not found in Jesus.

• 53:59Speaker 01

  We were building on something that was sinking sand. And it's not stable. So anything of any magnitude or size could blow us over and really wreck our world. And I think that's where it's like, it's hard to watch. It's hard to watch people. When you know that there's a found a firm foundation that you could build your life on, regardless of what's happening. And when you watch people.

• 54:24Speaker 01

  Not do that. It's hard because you want to like, I know for me and Phoebe, we just want people to find and experience the joy that we have. Yeah, that's that you're building a foundation on the rock of Jesus, on a firm foundation on him. And then these books that I still consume these books. They're just not my foundation. Like I love listening to podcasts. I love reading books. I love

• 54:51Speaker 01

  consuming creative inputs for our job. They're just on top of what I'm building the the foundation that I laid. Yeah. Does that make sense?

• 55:01Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I think the way you describe that. I paint a picture of how I view what I'm going through right now.

• 55:11Nick Bare?

  I spent the last

• 55:14Nick Bare?

  thirteen years working on VPN.

• 55:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:20Nick Bare?

  And we built this house. But it's taken a long time. It's taken a long time and it was really hard. And it was really hard and took a long time because I've been trying to find all the materials.

• 55:36Nick Bare?

  I'd build the house one way, realizing I built it the wrong way. So I have to fix things. And things would fall apart along the way. So I'd go patch them and repair them. I had to find different contractors and subcontractors to come in and help build this house. And in over thirteen years,

• 55:54Nick Bare?

  the house has been built.

• 55:56Nick Bare?

  And it's strong.

• 55:59Nick Bare?

  But now maybe that house has been wiped down. I'll have to build a new house.

• 56:06Nick Bare?

  But now I have all this knowledge based off of all this learning and understanding from the last thirteen years. And this new understanding.

• 56:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:15Nick Bare?

  So I can now go build this new home, this new house on a stronger foundation. I have all the materials I need. I know I know exactly what materials are needed. I have I have the resources. I know the contractors. I know the subcontractors who are going to do the best work. I will make mistakes along the way, but there'll be smaller mistakes. And this house will be bigger. It'll be stronger. It'll be more durable. It won't be as as weak or vulnerable or susceptible to breakdown and destruction.

• 56:50Nick Bare?

  Because I've learned

• 56:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:52Nick Bare?

  over a long time of what it takes to to build strongly.

• 56:57Speaker 01

  And it'll far exceed anything we can think or imagine, right?

• 57:01Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 57:01Speaker 01

  I think that's a crazy thing is wherever we go from here in terms of BPN, it'll always be bigger than we think when the foundation's that way.

• 57:12Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 57:13Speaker 01

  Because God's ways are above our ways. His thoughts are above our thoughts. God's dream for our lives are bigger than the dreams that we can have for our lives.

• 57:22Nick Bare?

  Which is crazy to think.

• 57:23Speaker 01

  Crazy because we dream so big, right?

• 57:25Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 57:26Speaker 01

  God's dream is bigger than anything we can think of for our own lives.

• 57:31Nick Bare?

  It gets me super excited for the the future.

• 57:33Speaker 01

  I mean, literally before I joined BPN, I was like, this is, I mean, doing freelance is really hard, but I was like, I I felt like I was doing what God was asking me to do. And I was being obedient and I got to see and do things that I never thought. And then I joined BPN. And never in a million years

• 57:53Speaker 01

  did I think on May 4, 2020, when I walked in here, that in September of 2025, we would sit in like a podcast room.

• 58:01Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 58:03Speaker 01

  Because God's dreams are always bigger than our dreams.

• 58:06Nick Bare?

  What did life look like before BPN for you, you and Phoebe?

• 58:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, me and Phoebe. So I used to work in ministry. You know that church world. So I graduated college from LSU and then I went to work at a few churches in Shreveport, Louisiana, small town Shreveport, Louisiana. I was actually in Bossier City. Anyone that's familiar with Shreveport knows where Bossier is. If you don't know where Bossier is, just don't. It's okay. Um, worked in ministry there and that was like the beginning of my ministry career. And then I I got hired at a church in Dallas. And in between that is when I met Phoebe. Um, I was actually interviewing for a job at Celebration and so was Phoebe. She ended up taking the job, getting the job. And I was just more focused on Phoebe.

• 58:53Speaker 01

  And we met, we dated a long distance and we both finally moved to Dallas. And we got engaged in Dallas and then we were on staff at a church there, building a life that we loved and we got married. And two weeks after we got married, Phoebe woke me up one morning and said, I don't feel like this is home. And I was like, well, that's funny because I signed a 12 month lease. Like three weeks ago. And so my, we prayed about it and we almost moved to Seattle. And one weekend we came to Austin because Phoebe's parents live here. And I just told Phoebe, I'm not leaving without an answer. And I'll never forget, we were on the South Congress Bridge. You know, the time of the year when the bats come out and there's like hundreds of people standing.

• 59:36Speaker 01

  So we were at the very end of the bridge and the bats were flying out. It has nothing to do with bats. I was just sitting up against a car and I just had this wave crash over me of peace that we needed to move to Austin. The only thing that we knew that we had here was Phoebe's parents and a church that we love and that celebration. And so we drove back to Dallas. We told our bosses, we quit our jobs that both had full-time, you know, salary income with benefits and we came here with no jobs and no money, but. How old were you guys? Oh gosh, Phoebe was 23 and I was 26. So I would not advise anyone to do that.

• 1:00:18Speaker 01

  Outside of if you feel like God's called you to do that, you can like confidently say that. Now in hindsight, like. It led you to where you had to be. Absolutely. And no one will ever be able to question like, hey, do you know what it's like to walk by faith? Like I absolutely do because I, I felt like me and Phoebe heard the voice of God, heard the call to come to Austin. And we gave up everything and it was a really humbling experience. So I went into full-time freelance photography. We lived with Phoebe's parents for almost a year. God bless her parents. I can't imagine as a parent that your daughter gets married and then they live with you for nine months. It was such a humbling experience.

• 1:01:02Speaker 01

  I wanted to give up photography so many times. And I, I tried, I really did. Over three years, I tried multiple times to like, okay, look, this is really hard. Like, I mean, nothing compares to like what you went through. Like for me, that was really hard. We were, we both didn't have jobs. Phoebe ended up being a nanny and I was just like trying to make freelance work. And every time I tried to quit.

• 1:01:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, I remember I was looking at jobs on like Craigslist. I was desperate.

• 1:01:35Nick Bare?

  To do what? What did you want to do?

• 1:01:36Speaker 01

  Anything. I was like, maybe I'll find something. I would look and be like, maybe God will just speak to me about one of these jobs on Craigslist.

• 1:01:43Nick Bare?

  Cause you wanted security?

• 1:01:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just was like, there's no way that I'm still doing exactly what God wants me to do because it got so hard. We, I mean, it was just like every dime mattered. Like every dollar mattered. It would, and one day I was looking and I was just over it. And I was looking for jobs and I literally will never forget. I felt like God said, it's not what I told you to do. I was like, well, these bills are very real and I'm getting frustrated. And you know, I still have, okay, whatever. I got over my anger and just kept chugging along and then Jordan moved here. Me and Jordan became close friends and

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  he asked if I wanted to shoot the Austin Marathon.

• 1:02:32Nick Bare?

  How did you and Jordan meet?

• 1:02:33Speaker 01

  Crazy, right? So the the pastor I mentioned earlier, Brian Cromer, I worked with him in Dallas. He went to plan a church in Cincinnati called Queen City.

• 1:02:44Speaker 01

  The first person that attended his church was Michael Malley. Michael Malley texted me and said, hey, I have a buddy, Jordan, moving down to Austin. He's gonna work in a supplement company. He's good people. Could you meet him? Jordan moved here on like a Tuesday. I met him on Wednesday. And we just became pals. And three, uh, three months, four months later, Jordan asked if I wanted to shoot the Austin Marathon with you.

• 1:03:08Nick Bare?

  This is 2019, right?

• 1:03:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. So, and then I shot the marathon.

• 1:03:13Nick Bare?

  I'll never forget the day that, I, I'll never forget meeting you for the first time.

• 1:03:18Speaker 01

  Same.

• 1:03:20Nick Bare?

  I knew you were shooting the marathon for us, but I didn't meet you prior to the finish line.

• 1:03:26Speaker 01

  No, I met you for two seconds at the start.

• 1:03:28Nick Bare?

  This is 2019. This is my second marathon ever. I ran like a four hour, 15 minute marathon there. And getting across that finish line, I was in the pain cave.

• 1:03:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, you were.

• 1:03:41Nick Bare?

  I remember getting across the finish line and you were taking photos. And you kind of like just came up next to me and you had grabbed my arm, put it around you. They carried me to like over to where Jordan was and Steph was. And you gave me like a bottle of water and like snacks. And you dropped me off with my crew. And I'm just thinking there in that moment. This guy just, he's here to serve. He gets it. And we need him on this team. The team was tiny then. I mean, we had four people.

• 1:04:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:24Nick Bare?

  But that's all it took was one small interaction.

• 1:04:28Nick Bare?

  I was like, I need this guy on the team.

• 1:04:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:32Nick Bare?

  And how, how shortly after that moment, did you start working for me?

• 1:04:35Speaker 01

  Gosh, that was February and then, what's so funny is when I left the race, I was like,

• 1:04:42Speaker 01

  I mean, Phoebe could remember it all. I was like so consumed with, how do I get around those people again? Cause it was one of the first times where I felt like

• 1:04:53Speaker 01

  the things that I valued and the type of person I was like wanting to be was, was I found them. Like really driven, care about fitness, but also care about people. Like I could just tell you guys cared about each other. So for like two months, I just like couldn't stop thinking about it. Of course, I'm still shooting freelance stuff. And then that was in February and then Jordan called me. I can't, I drove up to the old HQ to drop off a mic to Jordan. And I had been doing like these crazy shifts because we were bringing our church online because of COVID. We were just, there was like 10 of us that knew how to do that. So we were just working like 15 hour days at the church. And he was like, hey, do you want to come work here? I was like, I could have cried. I was like,

• 1:05:38Speaker 01

  yes, but what do you mean? And then he was like, he told me about the job, social, you could come do photo. I know you're doing freelance, but like if you're interested, let me know. And I was like, yeah, absolutely. And then yeah, I, I believe he was like, you want to come in for an interview? I was like, oh yeah, sure. Well, there wasn't an interview. Do you remember that?

• 1:05:58Nick Bare?

  No.

• 1:05:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. Jordan was like, come in for an interview. It was in when we were in the old office and I'd come like prepared for an interview. And I walked in, we went into the. The podcast room? Yeah. Yeah, the old, old, old podcast. And you just said, hey, this is a job. Here's a salary. Can you start in two weeks? I was like, I remember being like, yeah.

• 1:06:21Speaker 01

  And I tried to ask you a bunch of questions and you just were like, yeah, this is what we need. We're just trying to do this thing and does that sound good? And I just asked you to email me like an offer letter. Yeah. Because I had to like, I wanted to be able to like sign it and show my work. That I was like legit leaving and had a job. Yeah, that was a

• 1:06:43Speaker 01

  that was a funny day. But also like a really powerful day because when you actually sent me the offer letter, which I'm pretty sure you like Googled it. Oh guaranteed. And it had like an initial box with your name and then like your title and then like a line for me to sign. It was really funny. It's not like what we have now. No, not even close. This was like you sent it to me from your Gmail account. It was so unethical. But I'll never forget it. And the reason was I opened it. I'll never forget where I was sitting. We lived downtown, that house we always ran by. And I was in this yellow chair. We had this yellow retro armchair that had ducks on it. And it sat in the corner next to our TV. And I think you sent the offer letter like two days later. So like forty eight, forty eight hours. I was like sweating bullets.

• 1:07:28Speaker 01

  And I got the email, opened it and I just, again, that like wave of peace like crashed over me. Cause at this point, I think it'd been three years doing freelance. And I just kept going because I feel like that's what God was telling me to do. And I'll never forget, I feel like God told me in that moment, this is why you always obey. And I sobbed. Cause in that moment, I felt like for the first time in a long time,

• 1:07:56Speaker 01

  that that small decision, I say small, it was a big decision that led to like three years of just kind of searching and obeying. It was a moment where I got to see a small portion of like fruit that I got to reap from being obedient for years. And that's why when I came, I was like,

• 1:08:18Speaker 01

  I'm gonna steward this as much as I can because I I know what it was like to be on the other side of it. And I felt like God brought it into my life and I don't want to not steward what God is had brought into my life. Yeah, so that was five and a half years ago.

• 1:08:33Nick Bare?

  We have this photo from those early days that I love and it's you, me and Jordan sitting in that old podcast room.

• 1:08:41Speaker 01

  Our creative meeting?

• 1:08:42Nick Bare?

  Yeah, we're all we didn't have a table. We didn't have chairs. All of our gear was kind of on the perimeter of the walls.

• 1:08:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:49Nick Bare?

  And we were sitting there doing like a creative meeting.

• 1:08:53Nick Bare?

  The team was so small then.

• 1:08:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, and we were probably meeting about VPN and your content.

• 1:08:57Nick Bare?

  It was all on the same thing. And we'd show up and we didn't really have a marketing calendar or a plan. We'd show up that day and it was what are we creating? What are we filming? What do we need to do? And let's figure it out.

• 1:09:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:14Nick Bare?

  But those early years were so much fun.

• 1:09:18Speaker 01

  They were crazy.

• 1:09:19Nick Bare?

  It was so much fun. It's still fun, but it was a different fun.

• 1:09:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is so much fun now. There's just things that we did then that you can't do now.

• 1:09:27Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:09:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was a lot of fun like remember me and Jordan would be like plan a photo shoot. And we would do it that morning and then we get a text from you at like 11 a.m. And you're like, hey, I'm running at three. And we would jump in your truck. And we go chase you down an old country road that's no longer a country road because Georgetown's huge now. And then we would come back and we would edit it right then and there. And then we do it all over again.

• 1:09:51Nick Bare?

  The quickest turnaround.

• 1:09:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:53Nick Bare?

  Man, over these last like five and a half years.

• 1:09:59Nick Bare?

  I mean, you you you and Jordan both have been with me through it all. There's been good days. There's been really bad days.

• 1:10:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:08Nick Bare?

  There's been easy times. There's been really hard times. It has been such a a journey, like the entrepreneurial journey is it's so.

• 1:10:22Nick Bare?

  Interesting.

• 1:10:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:24Nick Bare?

  And what makes it so interesting is the people that are on that journey with you. And one of the reasons I wanted to have you on the podcast for conversations, we've truly been, of all the people that I work with and know, we have done life together in sync.

• 1:10:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:45Nick Bare?

  And out of sync, the most of these last five and a half years.

• 1:10:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:49Nick Bare?

  You joined early on, we had our daughters within days apart. Our sons, close together.

• 1:11:00Nick Bare?

  We've experienced life together. We went on our first baby moon together in Cabo.

• 1:11:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:08Nick Bare?

  And you have been so loyal and faithful through it all. And I'm so grateful and appreciative for you. You have been so faithful and there have been people in my life who have come and go. And when times have gotten hard, they've ran and they've taken the easier route. And you stuck with me and this mission the whole way through.

• 1:11:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:35Nick Bare?

  So I'm so just grateful for you as a friend.

• 1:11:41Speaker 01

  I appreciate that.

• 1:11:42Nick Bare?

  Yeah, absolutely. It's like, I think the older I get too, and as our kids get older and

• 1:11:50Nick Bare?

  I just like sit back and I reflect, I'm like, there's certain people in my life who have jumped ship when things got hard. But you've been one of those people who have just like stuck with.

• 1:12:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it's one of those things like,

• 1:12:06Speaker 01

  I believe building deep, meaningful relationships is like critical to life, like.

• 1:12:17Speaker 01

  Life is hard. Like, life is good. Life is great. But life is inevitably hard. And I don't think that God designed us to do that alone. And I

• 1:12:30Speaker 01

  do my best to recognize in those moments when I feel like God brings people into my life. I don't feel like God brought me, like, the way I view it, I don't feel like God brought me into your life. I feel like God brought you into my life. And I just decided I wanted to, like, build a, yes, build BPM. Absolutely. Wanted to build BPM. I still want to build BPM. But I never wanted to build it at the expense of

• 1:12:58Speaker 01

  the friendship that me and you have built, and me, you, and Jordan have built. Two of my best friends in life. You've seen, we've lived our best days, boring days, and the worst days together. Mm-hmm. And I feel like, and what I know to be true is that relationships that are worth fighting for, you have to go through that stuff. Like, if you really want to build a strong, like, have strong friendships and strong community, you have to be able to go through all those things together. Yeah, I agree. You have to be able to, like, have the hard conversations. We've had hard conversations over the years. And we've stuck it out. And I feel like you've stuck it out with me, I've stuck it out with you. And I'm grateful for our friendship. And

• 1:13:45Speaker 01

  for no other reason than, like, I just enjoy being friends. Mm-hmm. And I love watching our kids grow up together. And I love that our wives are friends. And I love that we now get to share our faith in Jesus together. And I know there's gonna be more highs and more lows. And obviously, so grateful for BPM. It'll never top how much I care that me and Phoebe care about you and your family, though.

• 1:14:14Nick Bare?

  I can relate to that.

• 1:14:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:14:17Nick Bare?

  The relationships come first. The people always come first.

• 1:14:20Speaker 01

  And it's really hard. It's really hard, especially when it gets messy.

• 1:14:23Nick Bare?

  Yeah. Yeah, I've, I've, I've been in seasons where

• 1:14:29Nick Bare?

  I have deprioritized the relationships over certain business decisions.

• 1:14:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:14:35Nick Bare?

  And they've never been the right decisions or choices.

• 1:14:38Speaker 01

  But having the people around you that can like,

• 1:14:41Speaker 01

  I know you've stuck it out with me when I'm not been in a good spot. Now, is it like pretty? No, but like, I never have felt like in the friendships that I've built that are like, deep relationships. When I'm in one of those unhealthy spots, they're still, they're still there. It's not pretty, but I feel like I've watched you stick it out with me over the years as well.

• 1:15:01Nick Bare?

  I appreciate that.

• 1:15:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, like when you were in Nashville, even though we were apart and not building like in tandem here, I feel like we, you stuck it out with me through that time.

• 1:15:13Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:15:14Speaker 01

  When I was here. And then, you know, when, when Phoebe miscarried that first time, I feel like you guys stuck it out with us and you, like, it's messy, but

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  I think there's a, I fully believe that God designed us to live in a relationship with people.

• 1:15:33Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I agree.

• 1:15:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:36Nick Bare?

  I'll never forget, uh, you know, when we found out we were pregnant.

• 1:15:42Nick Bare?

  We were out at a Golden Rule.

• 1:15:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:44Nick Bare?

  And I think it was a, a big like team dinner we were doing. We walked off with you guys and we're like, hey, we gotta tell you something. We're pregnant. And you guys said, us too.

• 1:15:57Speaker 01

  Dude, Phoebe had been like tripping all night. Cause she was like, I gotta tell Steph, I gotta tell Steph. I was like, you. Yeah, totally. Just, what's so funny is didn't you know that Phoebe was pregnant with Otto before I knew him?

• 1:16:09Nick Bare?

  Yes.

• 1:16:11Nick Bare?

  Yeah, Steph told, uh, Steph told me.

• 1:16:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, cause I texted you and I was like, guess what? We're pregnant. And you were like, yeah, I knew yesterday.

• 1:16:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was, that was a fun time because then the girls were born.

• 1:16:20Nick Bare?

  Days apart.

• 1:16:21Speaker 01

  Two days apart. Yeah, we were in the hospital together.

• 1:16:22Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:23Speaker 01

  I remember you brought your Yeti in.

• 1:16:25Nick Bare?

  With all my, all my meals prepped.

• 1:16:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I had prepped meals, but because Phoebe was an emergency C-section, they all went bad in a cooler in the, in my car.

• 1:16:35Nick Bare?

  Dude, I, I ate hospital sushi, uh, when we were in the hospital with Charlie.

• 1:16:41Speaker 01

  Did you fight for your life?

• 1:16:42Nick Bare?

  I survived somehow, but looking back, I'm like, that was the stupidest thing I've ever done. Hospital sushi.

• 1:16:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's what I'm like grateful for the discipline we've built. I'm like, I can't eat hospital food.

• 1:16:52Nick Bare?

  No, no, I had a core of meat and potatoes in, in my Yeti for days.

• 1:16:57Speaker 01

  In your bag?

• 1:16:59Nick Bare?

  So, you know, these last five and a half years,

• 1:17:04Nick Bare?

  what would you say is like one of the biggest key lessons, takeaways from watching BPN go from literally being a startup when we had four people to what it is today with forty-five full-time employees and to bigger business and there's more systems, more, more leadership, more operations. What's something like you really take away from those years?

• 1:17:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was, I was thinking about the last night when I was looking at the notes you sent. And look, one of the things I wrote down, which I think we've talked about, which is more isn't always the answer. And we learned that the hard way.

• 1:17:51Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:51Speaker 01

  I think that more businesses and brands would be successful if they realized that more is not the answer. And success meaning I think that they would be more, more brands that could stand the test of time. If they realize that more is not the answer, always the answer. I think there's moments where like adding is what you need, but I think what we walked through was when we started to go rapidly, you know.

• 1:18:23Speaker 01

  All the opportunities appear. Let's, let's sponsor this. Let's go to this race. This add this product. Let's do a parallel. Let's do these things. And now that we've been hyper fixated on focusing down and getting very specific about who BPN is and who we're serving and what we're offering. I've just realized that more isn't the answer. I think more also is the, can be the enemy of excellence. I feel like we've watched that over the years where

• 1:18:54Speaker 01

  we tried to launch, you know, different products or we tried to be a wellness and endurance and a performance category brand and trying to be great in all those categories is really hard. And because you're, you're talking to so many different people, right? And I think what I, one of the biggest lessons professionally I've learned is more is not always the answer than it can be the enemy of excellence. Would you agree?

• 1:19:20Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I was actually just thinking about that on my run this morning.

• 1:19:24Nick Bare?

  Sometimes it's, it's, it's one of those things you, you can't really measure, but you have a, a gut feel.

• 1:19:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:30Nick Bare?

  And a intuition. And this is where I really lean on you and Jordan both to tell me, hey, I think we're doing too much or we're not doing enough.

• 1:19:40Speaker 01

  You know what's funny about that though, is I feel like the, because someone the other day asked, like, how do you build intuition like in a team? I think you build intuition by providing clarity. I feel like me and Jordan have, over the years, gotten more of a gut feeling that you always tell us about because you've laser focused the brand.

• 1:19:59Speaker 01

  Like the tighter that you've like reined in the vision, the easier it is for me at least to have this like intuition feeling because you've provided clarity on like this is the direction versus when it's really wide.

• 1:20:12Nick Bare?

  Yeah, I think, I think clarity allows you to make really easy, consistent decisions. Easy meaning it's either an absolute yes or it's an absolute no.

• 1:20:23Nick Bare?

  And when that vision isn't clear and there's a lack of clarity, you don't know what you say yes to or what you say no to. There's no core values. There's no, no purpose. There's no goals.

• 1:20:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:35Nick Bare?

  And there's still moments where I sit back, I'm thinking we're doing a little too much right now.

• 1:20:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:20:43Nick Bare?

  And then that, that calibrates your intuition and gut for the next season, next chapter.

• 1:20:50Nick Bare?

  But I would completely agree with that. Where the bigger you get, I think you feel this need to do more, to be in front of more people and eyes and launch new products and seize more opportunities. But I would argue it's actually the opposite.

• 1:21:04Speaker 01

  Why do you think people do it?

• 1:21:07Nick Bare?

  Because you're trying to maintain momentum. It's like we grew 20% last year. This year, we have to grow at least 20% to maintain that same momentum. So you feel a pressure to do all of these new things to keep up with the level of growth that you've been sustaining for the years prior. And you realize that it doesn't mean you have to do more. You can do more with less. You can maintain momentum without taking on more opportunities.

• 1:21:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, more doesn't equal momentum.

• 1:21:38Nick Bare?

  No, no, no, not at all.

• 1:21:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, we've learned that.

• 1:21:41Nick Bare?

  Yeah, because there's been a lot of times where we're doing more and we have less momentum. And that feels horrible.

• 1:21:48Speaker 01

  I still, what's crazy is I still feel the pull, though. I don't know if you do, like, to do more. Like, me and Jordan talk about it a lot, like, specifically on social, we're like, because we'll go these, like, stretches, like the Ultra, where we're, like, pumped out a lot of stuff. And then there's just nothing coming that feels like that. And we're like, should we be doing more? And the reality is, no, we shouldn't.

• 1:22:14Nick Bare?

  Definitely. I, I, I experienced that same thing. Sometimes when there is what feels like it's a lull in time, you feel the need to fill the calendar. But as soon as you fill the calendar, oftentimes you overfill it.

• 1:22:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:28Nick Bare?

  You overcommit. And then the things you take action on, they just, they don't hit, they don't land.

• 1:22:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, instant gratification.

• 1:22:37Nick Bare?

  Yeah, like, one of the reasons the Ultra hit so hard is because there was an extended period of time where we didn't do something of that level and capacity.

• 1:22:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:47Nick Bare?

  So it was the right opportunity, it was the right time, it was the right race. It was a perfect symphony of all these things.

• 1:22:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:59Nick Bare?

  Well, brother, I appreciate you.

• 1:23:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely, I think.

• 1:23:05Speaker 01

  What you've been building is crazy.

• 1:23:08Nick Bare?

  We.

• 1:23:09Speaker 01

  What you've been building is crazy. I'm honored to be a part. When you texted me, I was walking into the sauna. My stomach fell to the floor. I was like, because I thought at first I thought you wanted me to come hit the record button. And then you were like, no, come have a conversation. But yeah, absolute honor of a lifetime to be on the podcast, but also just to do life with you.

• 1:23:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, BPN will never replace friendship for me. And I'm grateful and I'm excited to see what we we build, right?

• 1:23:39Nick Bare?

  And that's what I get so excited about coming to work every day is that I'm just hanging out with my bros.

• 1:23:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:48Nick Bare?

  And we get to work on fun projects and have great, like real meaningful conversations. And we're doing it because we love it with people we love and care about.

• 1:24:01Speaker 01

  What? Sorry, I know you're about to end it.

• 1:24:05Speaker 01

  What would you tell people who don't have that? Because I actually really do struggle with giving an answer for that. Because I know what we have here is really special. I think anyone that walks through the doors, they're like, I've never been anywhere like this. And there's a part of me that doesn't know what to tell them.

• 1:24:21Nick Bare?

  I mean, I think it was back to the earlier part of our conversation is people try to guide their own life, muscle their own life. And I think you have to take action

• 1:24:36Nick Bare?

  to create the opportunities that you want to experience and where you want to be. But at the same time,

• 1:24:44Nick Bare?

  that's where having a faith and following Jesus is so foundational.

• 1:24:49Speaker 01

  The ultimate fulfillment.

• 1:24:51Nick Bare?

  Where let God guide you there.

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:55Nick Bare?

  Because you're obedient to what he's asking you to do.

• 1:24:57Speaker 01

  It would probably be crazy if someone heard like, I'm sure you feel this right now, is how I feel is what we do and what we have is so crazy. But it's not the ultimate fulfillment of my life. My fulfillment is found in Jesus. And this is a huge blessing alongside of it. And I think that's like, now I'm starting to answer my own question, which is if your fulfillment and your confidence, your security is found in Jesus, then when these opportunities present themselves, they're just like a huge blessing to be a part of.

• 1:25:29Nick Bare?

  And it'll make you.

• 1:25:33Nick Bare?

  Really have the ability to decide and choose who you spend your time with and around.

• 1:25:40Nick Bare?

  And I believe if you are really strong in your faith, in your beliefs, in your values, and then you find people who have those same beliefs, values, and faith, you are creating opportunities for yourself to position yourself somewhere that you will be truly fulfilled. As opposed to, hey, I just found this job that makes four times what we're making right now in this city that we don't want to go to, but we should go because we're gonna make a lot of money.

• 1:26:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:10Nick Bare?

  You get there, and you're like, ah, the money's great, but everything else isn't.

• 1:26:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's tough.

• 1:26:20Nick Bare?

  It's tough, and sometimes

• 1:26:24Nick Bare?

  that right thing is coming, but it's not on your timeline.

• 1:26:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, following God's not like a linear path. I think a lot of people view it like, I'm here, where I need to be is here, and it's gonna be like a straight line, and it's just not.

• 1:26:39Nick Bare?

  No.

• 1:26:39Speaker 01

  Following God is not a linear path, and that's okay.

• 1:26:44Nick Bare?

  It'll be on His timeline that is right for you to achieve what He has set out and laid the path for you to experience, achieve, and fulfill.

• 1:26:53Speaker 01

  And it's never on your timeline.

• 1:26:55Nick Bare?

  No, that's okay.

• 1:26:56Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 1:26:57Nick Bare?

  But that's what surrendering is all about.

• 1:26:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, because I've, over the years, in my short time following Jesus,

• 1:27:06Speaker 01

  when I push the timeline, or I try to get it, get my way, or achieve something,

• 1:27:14Speaker 01

  the, like, God's not in it. Like, I'm kicking the door down. I'm, like what we talked about, forcing the opportunity versus when God's leading, God's grace carries you, He opens the doors, He makes a way, He gives you the peace, all of those things, but I've had those seasons where... Like, I want this. And ultimately, like, if I focus on it night and day, I believe that God will give you over to the desires of your heart, which is one of the biggest fears in my life. You know, God talks about in the Bible, that, you know, God gave them over to the desires of their heart. Yeah, I don't want that. I want whatever God wants for me, I want that.

• 1:27:52Nick Bare?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:52Speaker 01

  I don't want to, because I know that my desires for my heart ultimately are fleshly. And I don't want to be given over to those desires. I want to, I want my heart to desire what God has for my family. And for me, and not just, I think, the, one of the biggest things I've learned over the years.

• 1:28:13Speaker 01

  Following God is not about what I'm doing.

• 1:28:17Speaker 01

  It's about who I'm becoming.

• 1:28:18Nick Bare?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:28:19Speaker 01

  And realizing that God cares so much more about who I am versus what I'm doing. And that is such a hard thing for high achievers to like grip, come to grips with. Like, I've found so much security over the last year, realizing that

• 1:28:36Speaker 01

  God cares so much just about who I am and that I'm becoming, who I'm becoming. The, the person I'm becoming, am I growing closer to Jesus? Am I being transformed into His image? Am I loving my kids? Am I loving my wife? Like, God wants me to steward this really well, and I want to. But I realize that God's number one thing that He cares about for me is, am I loving God? Am I loving people? And that all revolves around who I am. The, the purest form of who I am is what matters the most. Not, not my career, not our careers. They're really important. But who we are is vastly more important than what we do.

• 1:29:21Nick Bare?

  Yeah. So one of my favorite things that Pastor Lyle, Phil said on the podcast when I had him on. Talking about the difference between having a fear of God and being afraid of God. People are afraid of God because they're afraid of what he's gonna ask them to do. And they don't surrender. Because if God asked them to go move somewhere else, pursue this new life and change the course of direction,

• 1:29:47Nick Bare?

  "I kinda like the path I'm on right now, so I'm gonna avoid that." So I'm afraid of what, I'm afraid to go all in because of what God might ask me to do.

• 1:29:57Speaker 01

  To lie.

• 1:29:57Nick Bare?

  To lie.

• 1:29:58Speaker 01

  To lie. The path of following Jesus is the greatest path you can walk on. Literally, the ultimate fulfillment, the ultimate reward. Scary, yes, hard, sure.

• 1:30:10Speaker 01

  The peace that you get, can't explain it.

• 1:30:13Nick Bare?

  Trey Freeman, until next time. Love you, brother.

• 1:30:16Speaker 01

  Love you, man.