50th Episode Special: Bunny Terry

Bunny: (00:12)
Hi there everyone. And welcome to the lifesaving gratitude podcast. This is our 50th episode, which is pretty amazing. When we began this endeavor, I didn’t even know if we were gonna do five episodes and here, we are at 50. So, thanks for always showing up. Thanks for listening. Thanks for caring. And most of all, thanks for just checking in for this episode. I wanted to give you something that is really personal that’s from my heart. I wanted to share the insights and, and what I’m learning every day. You know, I’m learning from our podcast, guests from my co-host, who is also my daughter, Johanna Medina. I’m working from the people that I work with every day at the cancer foundation, the people who are either staffer, all tears,  , I’m learning from my writing coach. She’s, by the way, she’s gonna be a guest on the podcast in a few weeks. And I just wanna give you a spoiler alert. She’s both famous and way incredibly cool. And she writes about creativity in her new best seller, creative trespassing. And I, I, you know, I’m learning from my husband and from my kids and even my grandsons. And I, you know, I’ve decided that one of the most boring things in the world would be to stop learning I’m 61 and I’m learning more than I ever have before. And in fact, I read a book recently on, Stay Sharp by Sanjay Gupta that said the best thing we can do to save ourselves from any form of memory loss or dementia is just to continue to learn. So what I’m learning is that the pure joyous act of learning doesn’t ever have to end. And, and the most important thing I’m learning about is that creativity really, really is my calling.

Bunny: (02:10)
Wanna tell you a little story about myself? I wanted to be a writer. I think always, when I was eight years old, I typed on my family’s. My annual Underwood were that had F and E keys that stuck when you struck either letter. And I know there’s a whole generation of listeners out there that don’t even know what an Underwood is. So go online, do a search, look it up. It was this heavy metal manual typewriter that I couldn’t lift on my own. I always had to ask one of my brothers to move it into the kitchen table, which was the only place we had where I could write a story. But, typing was a really slow process and I was a terrible hunting and Peck typer until I got into typing class in high school. But it didn’t matter because I had just figured out that not only could I read books, I could also write stories.

Bunny: (03:11)
You know, I read a lot of books at the time. I read all those books that had belonged to my siblings before me, and I read the books that we got from the book mobile every month. And, and on the odd occasion, when we went to, to carry to the library, I’d get as many as they would allow. And they learned very quickly to give me more than the standard because we lived way out in the country. But I, I learned that not only could I read, which fascinated me, but, but that maybe I could write, I even, and I even gave a shot to creating prose, some poems sort of ALA Dr. Sous, because those were my favorite first books, but I just knew that someone somewhere was always putting together words that created something. And it seemed really logical to me that I could do the same thing because I, I loved reading so much.

Bunny: (04:02)
So, you know, I was eight years old. I typed stories about my sister and her boyfriends about my brothers going, hunting about having Sunday lunch at my grandma’s house. I typed everything on either loose leaf notebook paper or on index cards, because, you know, at the time we didn’t have what we consider now, copy paper, we’d talked, we called it typing paper at the time, but I eventually graduated to notebooks. And in junior high, I started writing in a little blue denim diary that somebody gave me for my 12th birthday. And, and I didn’t just write about having a crush on Mark Caldwell, who was this guy who was always moving onto someone else who, who was prettier or martyr or thinner or taller. But I also wrote stories about fights that my older brother was having with my dad and about my uncle Lewis having lung cancer and about all the things that I feared. And I wrote pages at a time in a really messy cursive script. And then I would lock it up with a key that I kept in a wooden box in my underwear drawer, because I was determined that no one was ever going to read what I had written.

Bunny: (05:12)
And I continued writing every single day for my entire life. I’ve been listening to conversations, and I’ve been writing down the dialogue and I’ve read everything I could get my hands on. And then you, you know, at some point I would say probably in my mid-twenties, I started reading books on how to be a writer. I made this my life study. I have notebooks full of writing, and there are notebooks in landfills somewhere because really it was 98% dribble at a whole lot of angst. But, but some of it was probably pretty decent. I wish I had all those words nearby so that I could easily remember what it was like to be 10 years old and then 17, and then a single mom with a four-year-old when I was 25.

Bunny: (05:57)
So writing was my meditation and my therapy, but it was also my practice in the same way that Seth Godin describes creativity in his book, the practice, I was really good at the practice I wrote almost every day. And so I followed those rules, which are, if you wanna be a writer, you have to write, just like, if you wanna be a painter, they say you have to paint, but let me tell you what I, I was always afraid of failing. I was always afraid of calling myself what I was, which was a writer. So instead, I got married to the wrong guy and I got a job at aloft. Then I got divorced and I kept working and working and working. And I was raising a child by myself and early in the morning, before he woke up, I’d write a story. And I dream about being published someday.

Bunny: (06:49)
And then I married the next strong guy. And I had a second child, which was a joy, despite the marriage. And I was writing all the time. I remember when Johanna was a baby, I had a laptop, but a little, not a laptop, cuz we didn’t have laptops then. But I had a personal computer set up in an attic room and I would write all the time. And I, and I worked at being a decent parent and then I got divorced again and I dated a lot of different people. And I even remember the mantra that one of my college boyfriends used, which was, this is all fodder for a novel. And I, and that’s what I would think I would think, well, you know, I’m failing at this, but this is fodder for a novel. I’m just gonna tell you another thing he said a lot was that variety is a spice alive, which I didn’t know at the time was code for I’m seeing other people besides you, but, but I digress all of the time that I was living, what a lot of folks would call a really difficult life as a single divorced mom with hardly two nickels to rub together.

Bunny: (07:56)
I was riding and it was the practice that kept me sane. So, if I started typing stories when I was eight and I kept notebooks and I wrote all the time, why didn’t I submit my writing for publication until I was 60? Well, I wanna tell you I didn’t do it because I was afraid. I was afraid that despite the fact that this was in my mind, my, my life’s calling, I was afraid that I was an amateur. And I was afraid that the moment someone else saw my work, that’d say that this which, which I felt was my life’s great work was no good. I didn’t trust myself and I didn’t trust my own talent.

Bunny: (08:39)
So what I wanna share with you today is what I’m finally learning after all this time, which is that if you can turn pro, which is what Stephenville calls it in his book, turning pro, if you can, you can tap your inner power. You can create your life’s work. I’m curious about why we don’t do what we dream about. I have a talented friend who was a paralegal with me for years, and she also painted she water, did water colors on the side because her mother is a relatively well known painter. And my friend would always say, oh, I’m working on this fun thing at home. And then it would end up in the garage and then it would end up back in a corner. And, and when I would go to visit her and we would be looking for something else, you know, maybe she had something that I needed.

Bunny: (09:34)
And one of the new houses I was moving to because I had just left a bad relationship would be back in the garage and would be looking for, you know, an extra headboard for a twin bed. And there would be this stack of canvases. And I would say, what is all this doing back here? You’re so talented. And she would say, oh, that’s, you know, I’m too busy with work. I’m too busy, black. But so now just now in the midst of a drama in her own home with her beloved husband, who is in the early stages of dementia, she is finally beginning to paint an earnest.

Bunny: (10:14)
And I think that it’s because she’s really in the, that she’s wasted years doing something other than her calling. I have to tell you; she is painting bold Bryce watches of color. She’s putting her heart on those canvases in ways she never would’ve allowed herself before. So what I’m learning is that if we don’t follow our passion early, early in life, we may end up making choices that feed us in ways that are not particularly healthy in turning pro. Steven Presfield talks a lot about how some addictions can be traced to us, not following our passion. And we’ve had guests on the show before who talk about the same thing and, and we’ll put a back link to those talks, but, but let’s, let’s talk. I I’m learning to be that creativity is my calling, but I also wanna talk for a moment about giving ourselves permission to fail. Because if I had given myself at 30, if I hadn’t been so tied to the outcome, if I hadn’t been so lost in my own insecurities, I might have already published six or seven books.

Bunny: (11:38)
I would not give myself permission to fail maybe because it felt so huge to me. But in the past seven, I’ve learned a really important truth, which is it’s not failure if you don’t quit. And I guess in the most simple lay terms, that means I never failed as a writer because I never quit. Of course, somebody might look at my book sales for the past year publication for life saving gratitude and say, wow, you think selling just over 500 books is a roaring success. I mean, weren’t you, weren’t you shooting for bestseller status. Didn’t you have a dream that you’d be asked to appear on the Ellen show. I mean, weren’t you always secretly hoping that someone would wanna make a movie of your story and that Laura diner, Jody foster would jump up and wanna play you. And I have to say, yeah, I did have those dreams.

Bunny: (12:35)
When I was finishing up the editing on this book, I thought, wow, where is this gonna go? When I was a little kid, I used to practice my interviews with Johnny Carson on the tonight show every afternoon in my Treehouse. I’d love to hear from some of you who did that because I would sit in the Treehouse and Johnny would ask me a funny question. And I would say, well, this, this was born long ago in a farmhouse in Eastern New Mexico. I would’ve been the most boring guest he had, but I also knew a little over a year ago when I was finishing up the book that I could have given a hell of an interview on Ellen. I can’t believe that she’s gonna cancel her show before I get to show up. But the most important thing is that I finally gave up my investment in the outcome. I finally said, I’m not scared to send my book out into the world because it’s either gonna stand on its own merit or it’s not. But regardless of what happens, I’m gonna continue to write. And I hoped that perhaps that one book might make things better for one person.

Bunny: (13:47)
So here’s the most important thing I’ve learned about creativity. I personally have to stop being tied to the outcome. I just have to do the practice. And I also had to realize that being a writer wasn’t a society that, and that my stories were equally important. They were just as important as everyone else’s and I had to be my own self. And I had to use my own voice because you know what everybody else was taken in Elizabeth Gilbert’s book, big magic, which should be required reading for the entire world. But certainly, for those of us who are interested in creating something, there’s a lot about first giving yourself the permission to be creative and then giving up on the outcome. And there’s also the idea that inspiration shows up for every single person. There’s not some secret society out there of creative people that you are either born into, or you aren’t inspiration shows up for everyone.

Bunny: (14:49)
And we just have to give inspiration space in our lives. And Elizabeth Gilbert, who, who wrote this sort of famous book called IPRE love. She, in big magic, she says that she believes inspiration is wandering the world, sort of like a Sprite or a ghost or a, you know, people used to call it. The muse inspiration is wondering around, just looking for folks who are committed to creativity and to doing the work. And, and I gotta tell you, I love that idea. I love the fact that when I sit down with my laptop or my notebook, or my remarkable inspiration is perhaps sitting in the corner saying finally, finally, you’re stopping to do the work and listen to what I have to tell you. And finally, you can catch some of, some of what I’m whispering in your ears.

Bunny: (15:40)
And, and Gilbert is quick to say inspiration, doesn’t show up every day. Sometimes you feel like you’re slogging through quick-sand. Some days you sit yourself a chair and you start typing or you’re painting, or you’re taking photos or filming whatever your creative endeavor is. And no one shows up, but you, but you know what, you’re still creating something. You’re still creating something. But here’s the trick when you show up on a daily basis for is gonna take notice and it’s gonna show up. And it’s almost as if someone else takes the will. I mean, you’ll, you’ll listen to authors. Talk about how they were writing a book and the, and the characters sort of seemed to take over it’s as if the story or the chapter or the photo or the painting or whatever your creative Deborah is it leaps from your brain onto the page. And, you, you feel blessed to just be a conduit for such amazing, amazing words. That happened to me a lot when I was writing my books.

Bunny: (16:50)
And so I, this book is a, a big inspiration to me as are so many of them. I could, I could read all of magic allowed to you. I could just, I’m just gonna provide you the link to Gilbert’s Ted talk. You gotta go and take a look at it, but I want you to hear this inspiration is for everyone. And you are part of that, everyone. So, whatever your creative endeavor is because you’re h an and alive and breathing, you’re eligible for the creative life. And simply being here makes you eligible. So even though I didn’t know what to call it at the time inspiration was showing up all those years, I wrote some pretty decent stories, but I didn’t have the guts to put them out there. And I didn’t think my inspiration was as good as other people’s inspiration. So I wanna go back to the idea of failure and talk about what happens when we learn that failure is a piece of life.

Bunny: (17:50)
I mean, it was, it was a piece for me. I mean, I’ve been married four times now, so I know all about failure in relationships and I’ve screwed up royally in a lot of jobs. I mean, there’s a, there’s a lawyer in Amarillo, Texas. Who’s still telling the story of when I left our essential witness out of the witness list. So, I failed in a lot of things, but I wanna talk about what ha happens in failure and what happens when we would get back up when we’re thrown off the horse and we gotta dust ourselves off and start all over. I’ve been reading this great book by Brene Brown called rising strong. And I just wanna say, right, you know, Brene Brown is, is too smart for the likes of me to even be reading. She’s so amazing. She does so much research.

Bunny: (18:39)
 I feel like I’m sort of flailing around out here in the world of gratitude and creativity and failure. And she’s written a book about, and it’s called rising strong. How the ability to reset transforms the way we live love parent and lead. I, was first interested in her because I needed to learn about leadership. If I was going to be the chair of the cancer foundation for New Mexico. And so I thought, well, the only thing I know to do is read everything there is on leadership. So, this book was a good one for me. And I’m, I’ve read it once. I’m reading it again. But what I learned from reading the book is that I was good at overcoming the pain of, and the failure of divorce and lost jobs and scripts and financial setback, maybe some marginal parenting. And the reason was that I, just had to get over it. I had to get back up. Nobody was gonna bail me out. There was not a prince charming coming.

Bunny: (19:39)
I didn’t know that I was learning that lesson, but I was, I was learning that,  , there was no choice, but to get back up over and over again, there’s this great video that before, but it’s on YouTube with is behind a company called behind the brand. And I’ll, I’ll include the link here, but Brian Elliot talked, this is a, an incredibly moving video, but Brian Elliot talks about how Seth Godin gave him this advice. And his advice was, Brian, there’s no prince charming there’s rescue boat coming. If you’re waiting to get rescued and for something else to change your life so that your life can really begin, that’s not going to happen. You’ve, gotta do it yourself. So there’s a link to that video in our materials. And if you have time to view, it it’ll make you cry, but, but it was it’s true.

Bunny: (20:39)
Each time I failed professionally or personally as horrendously painful as it was. And believe me is painful. Breaking up is hard. I couldn’t take the time to wallow in it and say that I wasn’t gonna move forward. Because if I had done that someone would’ve taken my kids away from me and a landlord would’ve thrown me out, or I would’ve had to move back in with my parents, which I did once to my mortification, after my first divorce. And I have to say they were saints to take me in as young and stupid as I was at the time. But here’s how failure works. If I hadn’t been willing to fail and then get back up, I might have stayed in that marriage. The one where somebody used the back of their hand to get my attention or, or the one where my new husband got drunk for the first time in nine and a half years on our wedding day, then, then he never sobered up. If I had been petrified by the thought of failure, I might still be, if I had been petrified by the thought of failure, I might still be in that horrific marriage in North Carolina. I

Bunny: (21:49)
Except folks. I think I’d be dead because I wouldn’t have gathered the fortitude that it took me to fight and win against stage four cancer. So, I wanna, I, I wanna say that we have to learn to embrace failure. Otherwise, we are never gonna get out of places is where we’re stuck. I read this great thing that said risk is inherent risk always exists. There’s the risk of doing something that frightens you, or there’s the risk of staying where you are. And I know people in my life who have stayed in really marginal marriages or relay or jobs because they, they just felt like the risk was too great, the risk of failure. But, but you gotta know, you run the risk of being stuck, where you are.

Bunny: (22:48)
So I eventually had to run the risk of putting all those words that I had written good or bad out into the world to see where they would land. And I, I don’t know how I got over my fear of failure in terms of writing. Maybe it was the win against stage four cancer, but I think it was that I finally learned after all this studying that I was no longer gonna be tied to the outcome, that even if I failed, I was going to continue to write. And now I would know how to do it even better. I would know how to fail better, which meant that I would know how to create better. I also learned the hard way that there were was no prince charming and there was no rescue boat coming. No, Ellen DeGeneres was not gonna call me and say, Bunny, I know you’re secretly brilliant.

Bunny: (23:44)
So if you’ll just write that book, I’m gonna invite you onto, onto the show to dance with me and chat about it. I had to be my own rescue boat, and I had to put my story out there. So I’m curious about you. Are you dreaming? Are, are you out there dreaming about a creative life that includes writing every day and publishing a book and sharing in your story? I mean it, do you just wanna go back to some dream that you had as a child? Do you wanna be a travel guide instead of a receptionist or, or do you wanna teach high school kids’ history rather than having a corner office? I’m just curious what creative life feeds your soul and, and what do you dream of when you’re really wide awake in the middle of the night? I’m gonna say this over and over.

Bunny: (24:32)
I don’t have all the answers and, and luckily that’s because I’m still learning, but I know that the life lived comfortably without expressing your creativity is a halflife. And that is a direct quote from Stephen Presfield that refusing to listen to that still small voice in my head that says, I have a lot more stories to write. It would make me crazy. If somebody said, you can never write another word in your life, I would have to become addicted to something. So, I’m pretty sure I’m gonna continue to fail higher. If I, if I treat my life in the same way that I treat the rest of my life, I’m gonna keep moving forward. And I’ll actually hear the truth, which is that I’m really a pretty good writer. I was so tied to my own vision of being a real writer that I didn’t know, I already was a real writer. Bene brown says in the book rising strong that I’ve been talking about, and the, this is a direct quote. If we are brave enough, often enough, we will fail. This is the physics of vulnerability.

Bunny: (25:37)
So it seems that we just have to accept that failure’s part of the practice, but here’s the next cool thing she says. And this tends to feel to me like I’ve been set free. Once we fail in the service of being brave, we can never go back once you fail. You’re never going to go back to being who you were before. And that’s a really good thing because once we fail, we have a whole new awareness of what being brave is, and we can’t fake it anymore. Failing actually makes us braver, which shows us when we’re showing up when we’re not, when we’re living our values and when we’re not. And please know that I’m paraphrasing, but I’m really quoting brown directly from the book. Her words are so good and so true that I had to share ’em with you.

Bunny: (26:25)
So if you want to live a creative life, you have to make the, that you’re gonna be creative. And that you’re also going to fail. Here’s one of my favorite quotes from Seth Godin’s book, the practice he says being creative is not a bolt of lightning from somewhere. It is a choice. So, I’ve wondered all the way around this. You know, I’ve talked about how I wanted to be a writer and how I was frightened. And I was a writer. It’s not, I wasn’t, it’s not that I wasn’t a writer. It’s that I wanted to be one so badly. And yet I didn’t trust myself and I couldn’t give myself room to fail.

Bunny: (27:06)
Luckily I’ve learned that failure. Yeah. I mean, it’s not, it’s not really not failure. If you don’t quit. It’s just another thing that happens on the way to a fulfilled life. So I wanna leave you with this tiny little chapter from Seth, go to practice. And this inspires me every day. I’ve written it down. I keep it with me. But even when I’m convinced that I should leave this writing and podcasting and communicating and leading the foundation life behind and maybe go and be the team leader at some real estate office somewhere, because really who am I to think that I can go from being a single mom and a paralegal and a realtor to being a creator? Who am I to think that I won’t fail at every turn in this creative life? So, here’s what Godin says in chapter 29, which is called So Far and Not Yet.

Bunny: (27:58)
And because you can’t see these words, I’m just gonna let you know that the first part of each line I read is a statement. And then it’s followed by either the words so far or the words not yet in parentheses. So, Godin says you haven’t reached your goals so far. You’re not as good at your skill as you want to be. Not yet. You are struggling to find the courage to create so far. And he goes on to say, this is fabulous news. It’s been going on since you were a little kid, something isn’t there when you want or need it. But then it is persistent and consistent effort over time can yield results so far. And not yet are the foundations of every successful journey. I don’t know what your so far or your not yet are. I mean, maybe you’re saying, man, I cannot lose the weight I wanna lose.

Bunny: (28:59)
Well, just put a, not yet behind that, or I don’t have time to write more than a page a day towards my book. And then add the words so far at the end of that, or I’m never going to be the painter that I wanted to be. And then you add the words, not yet. I mean, just let those words form your life every single day. So, we’re gonna come back to the creative life over and over simply because I think it’s too important to not talk about and I’m, and I’m blown away by everything I learn every single day. It’s so exciting. Listen, I still have to make a living. I still have to sell a few houses every year. I still have to do the things that I have to do out there in the world, but getting to do this, getting to do a podcast, getting to write more books.

Bunny: (29:54)
I can’t believe that I was doing this all along. I was just afraid to fail. So, it’s really important to talk about creativity. And if you’d like to talk to me on a personal level about your creative dreams and your aspirations and how to achieve them, I’ll do my best to help you find your perfect practice. Let’s just get cracking and creating together. And let’s, let’s rejoice when we fail because it, for being brave, I plan to fell early and often, and I can’t wait to share every step of the way with you. Thanks for being here for our 50th episode. Thanks for liking us for following us for writing reviews and for being part of the lifesaving gratitude community. And most of all, thanks for checking in.

Bunny: Hi everyone. This is Bunny with the Lifesaving Gratitude podcast. Just in case you don’t know me, I am a stage four colon cancer survivor and the author of Lifesaving Gratitude, which is a book about how gratitude helped me kick cancer’s ass. 

Today we’re going to talk to a special guest about how marketing and marketers can use gratitude to create business and connections with clients and also for themselves to create a really positive way to do their job. But first, I just want to thank you for being here and ask that you download the podcast if you’d like. And certainly subscribe wherever you listen to other podcasts. But enough about me and enough about the podcast. 

I want to introduce you to my special guest, who’s also a friend. Craig Cunningham is currently a realtor with Keller Williams, Santa Fe. And that’s how I met him. However, this is a recent career for him and he was, and correct me if I mispronounce the word, but you were a hotelier. Is that the way to say that?

Craig: Yes. 

Bunny: Yes. He’s spent 30 years in corporate sales and marketing. He’s traveled extensively. I’m going to let him tell you all the places that he’s been to, but he is the founder and principal of Cunningham + Colleagues marketing consultants. He was in the past the VP of marketing and quality for Seaport Hotels and World Centers and the VP of marketing for Core North America. So welcome Craig Cunningham.

Craig: Thanks so much for having me on your podcast.

Bunny: I’m excited. I know you have some great tips for all of our listeners. When I think about these podcasts, I always think about the people that are going to want the information we’re offering. I mean, we’re here to help people and we’re here to figure out how gratitude can make everyone’s life not just easier and simpler, but also fuller. So why don’t you start, Greg? Just tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us how in the world you ended up in this completely different career? And yet the truth is we’re still just marketers first and realtors, second. Tell me a little bit about yourself. Tell our listeners.

Craig: Yeah. So, as you said, I’ve been in marketing and sales for more than 30 years. I actually started off with an advertising and PR agency and then had the good fortune to be hired by my hotel client at the time, Wyndham hotels. At that time it was a North American chain and it’s now international. 

But from then on, I was in the hotel business. It’s definitely a career where if you are not focused on client service and the whole concept of gratitude, you’re not going to be successful. I always thought of our job as just surprising and delighting our guests and making them feel like they chose the right hotel to be with. And so it was always about waking up every day and saying, “What can I do to make somebody’s day and to give them a great experience?” And, of course, to do this you have to be grateful because they opted to choose your hotel over the million other choices that they had. 

So when I retired from the hotel business two years ago, I was trying to figure out what else I wanted to do with my life. I started doing more volunteering. I volunteer with Kitchen Angels here in Santa Fe to deliver meals to people who are not able to leave their homes. But I also started thinking of whether I wanted to do something else from a professional standpoint and the real estate business seemed like a natural extension, because it’s all about client service. You have to figure out ways to make people feel like they’ve made the right choice in working with you. So it’s all about being grateful every day and figuring out what can I do to help them today. How else can I extend what I’m doing for them in a way that they will appreciate and know that I appreciate them. So that’s what it’s really all about, because of course they could work with a million other other people

Bunny: Right. And let’s talk for just a second. Don’t you think that marketing has changed over the 30 years that you’ve been doing this? I mean, it seems to me that when we were kids, which was back before the crust cooled, we were sort of marketed at. Just talk for a minute about how marketing is different now than it was 10 years ago or 30 years ago.

Craig: It’s funny, because I was going to say the exact same thing. Back in the day, you were running a TV ad or a radio spot or a print ad and it was passive in that you just presented the information, unless you were direct sales. But really with the advent of so much digital media, you are instantly able to forge a relationship with customers through social media, through Facebook, Instagram, where you’re having a dialogue with them from the very beginning. This allows you to work in a much more personal way and to be able to find out much more quickly how you can serve those people. 

So I think it’s changed completely. Before you just sort of put it out there into the ether and hope that something worked, and now you’re able to engage. And I’ve found that so much in real estate where I’m getting emails from folks and then it evolves from the email into a phone call or a zoom call or something like that instantly. I think that’s so much better for both people. Especially for somebody like me who wants to find ways to engage with people and to be of service to them, it makes it a lot easier and more rewarding.

Bunny: I just think about the ways that I connect with my clients. It’s as if you’re somehow conveying to those people that you’re grateful that they showed up.

Craig: Yeah, exactly. I mean, my whole thought is that it’s not a transaction, it’s a relationship. And that relationship can be multifaceted. Once you’ve sold them a house or sold their house, I like to think that we’ve formed a friendship and a bond and that relationship is going to continue. And honestly, I don’t even care if I ever get another piece of business for them. Now think of them as friends. I want to have them to my house for dinner or go have coffee or something like that. 

I think that kind of thing that makes a difference for people in wanting to work with me.  It’s coming from a position of wanting to be of service to them and wanting to make them happy and finding the right solution for them. I’m working with some first-time-buyers right now and I kind of feel like they’re my kids. It’s about, okay, how can I really help them with this? And they’re grateful for the counsel I’m able to give to them, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with them. So it’s very rewarding. I think if you approach business relationships in the same way as you would with your friends, it’s a win-win situation for everybody.

Bunny: Well, talking about those first-time home buyers, I mean, that’s one of my favorite deals. You never make the most money from those transactions, but I’m so grateful to be reminded that we are providing the American dream when we’re selling real estate. Yeah. It’s amazing. It’s my favorite experience.

Craig: Yeah. I mean, for somebody to have their first home and to be excited about how they’re going to decorate it and what they’re going to do. And with this young couple, seeing them excited when they see a house brings out all my empathy and makes me want to really go the extra mile for them to make sure they find the right house at the right price for them. And then I just never want to stop. So then it’s like, “Okay, now I’m going to find this person for you to do the plumbing, and I’m going to find this person, etc, and I’ll be with you with you  to help explain things.” I just want to really continue to be of service.

Bunny: I talk a lot, especially on my blog, about Judy Camp, who was one of my first real estate mentors. She was a great friend and Linda Gammons partner for a long time before she passed away. But Judy Camp always says, “If you come from contribution, you can’t help but be successful.”

Craig: Yeah. I mean, just as I was saying, you can’t think of it as a transaction. I think, coming from contribution, how can I help you? How can I make this a better experience? How can I make this work? Because, especially in a real estate transaction, it can be stressful. It’s the biggest financial transaction for the majority of us. So how do you take the burden and the pressure away from them and sort of guide them through the process? I just think the main thing is that it’s much more fun, whether you’re doing volunteer work or in business, to wake up every day and figure out how I could make it fun for somebody else. Because then it’s fun for you and it gets you excited and passionate about what you’re doing.

Bunny: Well, it sounds like our big “why’s” are really similar. I certainly don’t want to put any words in your mouth, but it sounds like your big “why” is just to make the life of the people you come in contact with better.

Craig: Yeah. Of course making money is nice, but there are lots of ways to make money. It’s more about whether you are getting energy from it. And I think you really get energy when you’re working with someone and trying to figure out how you can help them, how you can make their day better, how you can make the service that you’re providing better. And also just doing things that saying, “What about if I do X, Y, Z?” and they’re  like, “Oh, you’ll do that for me?” And I’m like, “Of course.”

I have another set of clients where the transaction was fairly complicated and we were looking at lots of properties. Coming from a corporate background, I love to do spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations—things like that. And so after about the third thing we had to do, they’re like, “Oh, how are we going to organize all these bids?”  And then one of the guys said to the other guy, “Well, Craig’s going to do a spreadsheet for us. He’s probably already got it done.” So it’s that kind of thing where you’re looking for ways to make their experience better.

Bunny: So this is always a funny question for me to ask, because I have such a loose gratitude practice other than just waking up in the morning and saying, “thank you, thank you, thank you,” and then writing things down, but do you have a practice that you follow that helps you both in your business and your personal life?

Craig: Well, since I came into real estate with Keller Williams, which focuses a lot on being servant leaders and helping people, I’ve gotten into the habit of writing three things I’m grateful for that day. It could be that it’s a beautiful day or a dog or my partner or the opportunity to help somebody or the coffee’s really good that day, but waking up and appreciating what you have in your life is a good way to get in a good mindset for the rest of it.

Bunny: Oh, absolutely. Something I always say is that we kind of rewire our brains. We do. We create new neural pathways every time we say that we’re grateful. So in terms of nuts and bolts, is there a way that you let your clients know? I mean, I find that there are a lot of young people, young entrepreneurs or people who are new to business, who forget how to tell their clients how they’re grateful for them, even if it’s a line in an email. Do you have something that you do specifically over and over?

Craig: I think for me, it’s maybe more in the actions. I think of “This is really going to be helpful if I do this or if I provide this information.” I think it’s always in my voice and the way that I write. I try to always communicate openly and in a friendly and conversational manner. But then I also think “It would be really cool and really helpful if I did X , Y , Z.” I created a whole PowerPoint just on the neighborhoods in Santa Fe, because if you’re out of town it gets confusing. And that came out of a client saying, “Well, I don’t really know the neighborhoods.” And I thought that this would be a great tool for them. So I created it and then I was able to use it with others. 

So I think for me, maybe it’s sort of on the fly. I used to say in the hotel hotel business, “How can I make this a wow experience?” Because the other way to think about it is that every relationship is with people. When you’re in a service business you’re really in the business of creating memories. You can create good memories or you can create bad memory and it’s much more fun to create good memories.

Bunny: And that just comes from a spirit of generosity. I mean, you obviously want this to be the best real estate experience they’ve ever had.

Craig: Right. Right. I’m very grateful for the people that have helped me along the way. I’ve been very fortunate in my career to always work for people who were concerned about my career development and my personal development and became dear friends. And I’ve had a couple of bosses that have hired me twice in two different jobs. So I’m always grateful for the things that other people have done for me. 

So then I want to pay it forward. When I came to Keller Williams and I was introduced to the team here, there was so much openness and willingness to share and help and support. It has been fantastic. What strikes me the most is how grateful I am for what other people have done for me. And how do I pay that back?

Bunny: I mean, this is not a podcast to plug Keller Williams. It’s really more to talk about mindset, but the place where I learned it was sitting in that training room and learning that my mindset was the secret sauce. I mean, that’s the success piece, right?

Craig: Yeah, exactly. It’s not just about production and everything. It’s about weight and having a sense of gratitude and contribution and a sense of abundance. And I don’t mean that in a monetary way. It could be abundance in your health or your friends or all of that kind of stuff. And I think back to you. Your experience with cancer was far worse than mine, but I did have prostate cancer about nine years ago. Everyone I worked with during that entire time when I was going for radiation every day for 10 weeks was so supportive. And then on the last day of radiation, there was this very important meeting, and everyone knew it was my last day.My whole team had a celebration for me on my last day. That was turning something that was obviously a challenging situation into something where I knew they really cared about me and supported me.

Bunny: Wow. I’m interested to hear how your mindset was in the middle of that? 

Craig: I’m just by nature, an optimistic person. So even though it was scary, I felt like I was in good hands from a medical standpoint and I just felt like I was gonna beat it. I had done the education that I needed to and then it was really about having a positive mindset. 

This is probably too much information, but I’ll say it anyway. You’re doing the radiation stripped down to your boxer shorts. And so I jokingly put this Facebook thing about the fact that I needed a new pair of boxer shorts for every day. And people started sending me underwear—different pairs of boxer shorts for every day. So while I was sitting there in the big machine, where you’re sort of in there and it’s buzzing and scanning and all that kind of stuff, it got to be kind of a joke with the techs:  “Oh , what’s he going to be wearing today?”

Bunny: I love that.

Craig: That was a way to keep my spirits up. And also during that process, I really learned how to be very focused. I was in a waiting room with people that were going through, frankly, worse things than prostate cancer. Don’t get me wrong, prostate cancer is pretty serious. It is. People die from it. But I was seeing so many other people that were having a much more challenging time than I was. And we became a family. We all bonded together during that process, because we were all waiting, sometimes for an hour. So it’s things like that. And also things like the kitchen angels service, where it helps reboot you every day for how grateful you should be in your own life and grateful for the opportunity to help other people.

Bunny: Right. There are tons of people who do get what a gift it is. People who don’t even have a specific gratitude practice, but at least an attitude every day that you’re going to figure out something. I just wrote a blog post on limiting beliefs and one of the things that I wanted to convey is that we get to choose every single moment how we view the world. And maybe for somebody out there who’s brand new in business or who’s starting a new business. I just read a statistic that said that the entrepreneur demographics are changing. And now like 48% of new entrepreneurs are over 50. So hooray for the old people! 

But I know that there are people out there right now who are thinking, “Well, I’m not any good at marketing. I’m not any good at that piece of it. I can sell stuff, but I’m not good at the marketing stuff.” I’ve got to tell you, I’m married to a guy who doesn’t believe in self promotion because he came from a generation when you played down your assets, instead of being grateful for them and talking about them. So I’d love to hear what you have to say to somebody who has that limiting belief that they can’t market. And they can’t promote themselves.

Craig: You know, we could all market ourselves, and we do it every day in our interactions.  Whether we think of it as marketing or not, we’re marketing ourselves all day long in how we react and treat other people. The thought I had as you were talking about your husband thinking self-promotion sounds like a dirty word is that it doesn’t have to be you talking  about “me, me, me” and “I did this million dollars in revenue.” This is kind of a turnoff in some ways, because you’re talking about yourself. But if you’re talking about how you can help somebody else and how you can provide a good experience for them with your information and knowledge, you’re not talking about yourself in that context. You’re talking about how you can be of service. I think that’s a much easier way for a lot of people from a generation where we weren’t really supposed to be talking about ourselves.

Bunny: Well, it was pre-social media. Our face wasn’t out there. We just weren’t trained to tell people, “Here’s the reason you should hire me instead of the other person.”

Craig: Yeah, exactly. I mean, now we’re all our own brands on social media. But I think that rather than saying to somebody, “Here’s why you should hire me versus somebody else,” you should just talk about how you can be of service in what you do in an authentic way. Then people are more likely to want to work with you, because you’re radiating a sense of positivity and an interest in them. And they’re not thinking that you just look at them as a transaction and then you’re onto the next person.

Bunny: I frequently use with my marketing coaching clients the example of a dinner party. If you went into a dinner party (and this is for people who are just beginning in whatever business they’re in, especially if they’re self-employed), you wouldn’t simply walk in, take your coat off and say, “Hey, I’m selling something, come and talk to me.” Right? I mean, that’s what you don’t want to do with marketing. You want to start by building a relationship. Can you talk a little bit about that? 

Craig: I think it goes all the way back to Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People. People do like to talk about themselves. And so the first thing is you should be listening. That was one of the first things I learned in marketing client service. You need to ask questions and learn from your clients. Focus on what they need, as opposed to talking about yourself. You really want to establish a dialogue with them about their wants and needs and hopes and fears and everything else. Then you can talk about how you can address them. But nobody wants to go in and all of a sudden have you sit down and say, “Here’s my PowerPoint about me and what I’ve done.” It should be more of establishing, from the very beginning, a relationship of openness with folks. Then, after hearing from them, you can say “Well, here’s how I think I can you and here are some ideas that I have that I could share with you.” So I think a key thing is really listening from the very beginning.

Bunny: I even found that to be helpful when I used to first go on listing appointments. I was so nervous that I would sit down and I would immediately try to book an appointment. You know, if you’re not in real estate, a listing appointment is just like sitting down with a prospective customer. I would be so nervous in the beginning and really coming from a place of scarcity where I thought, “If I don’t get this listing, I’m not sure I can pay the rent next month.” And if you’re coming from a place of scarcity, you’re likely to self-sabotage. But that’s such good advice because things changed when I finally learned how to sit back and listen: “I’m here to help you. Tell me what it is that you need. Talk to me.” It’s so powerful to give a client time to talk to you. And I think people forget to do that, right?

Craig: Yeah. And I think sometimes we do it because we’re afraid. What I’ve learned so much over the years in business working with people is that people are terrified of silence, so they will immediately start talking. If there’s a second of silence, you jump in and start babbling. Lord knows I do it. But if you just let somebody talk and let it sort of sit there for a second and not just try to be filling in all the time. It drives me crazy when people are doing that. It’s much better if you can have the client talk and then ask some more questions and then be warm and reflective about it. Back to the Dale Carnegie thing, I think one of his first points was if you’re at the dinner party, ask people about themselves. Most people do like to talk about themselves. So ask them and don’t just start talking about yourself. 

Bunny: I think that even people who would say, “I don’t like to talk about myself,” really do want somebody to ask them and listen to them.

Craig: Yeah. And it’s not just asking them to go on and on. It’s more meaningful questions about, for example, why they decided to move here. Just those kinds of questions that get them thinking. Growing up in materialistic Dallas, the joke was that the questions at a party were like, “Where do you live? What do you do? What do you drive?” And so it’s not questions like that. It’s asking them more about their life experience,

Bunny: You just brought me to another completely different point, which is for any realtors out there listening: I think it’s really important to convey to your clients how grateful you are for where you live. I mean, if our lifestyle is such a selling point, don’t you think you should share that?

Craig: Oh, yeah, exactly. I mean, living in Santa Fe there’s so much beauty. I’m looking out my window right now at the beautiful blue sky. When I leave my house in the morning and I see the mountains, and then when I’m coming home at night and the sun is setting over the mountains and I see all the different colors and everything, it’s just breathtaking. It’s great to live in such a great and wonderful environment and in a place that is very spiritual, going back with the native Americans—respect for the earth and nature and all of those things—I think it does help center us more than a lot of other places.

Bunny: How do you convey that to your clients? I know you’re doing something really cool online that’s different from some other realtors.

Craig: Well, I’m not just posting on my Facebook page,” Hey, I just sold this house or just sold that house.” Well, that’s great. But I’m more talking about new experiences in Santa Fe: new restaurants, or a new place to go hiking, or something exciting that’s happening at one of the museums or things like that—enthusiastically talking about the experience of living in Santa Fe. And if down the road, by the way, you’re looking at this stuff and you decide you want to buy a house here, I would love to help you. But it’s more about conveying the reason why we all want to live here

Bunny: And tell us about your blog, because I think it’s amazing.

Craig: So I created this blog, which is called Santa Fe Scenes. It’s that same kind of thing where it’s just talking about having fun in Santa Fe. One of the things was, you know, we’ve got the old Santa Fe trail and we’ve got the old Pincus trail, but did you know that we had a Margarita trail and a Chocolate trail? Stuff like that. Just being whimsical about it and talking about some of the things are unique about the city and sharing my own passion for Santa Fe. I was very fortunate to be able to do a lot of international travel for my job. I was grateful for the opportunity that I was given to see places that I wouldn’t have seen otherwise from Bogota to Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and Beijing and places like that. So I’ve always been enthusiastic about travel and now living in such a beautiful place like Santa Fe, I want to share that enthusiasm with people.

Bunny: And you’re getting some good feedback on that I bet, right?

Craig: Yes, I am. I’m getting good feedback on it. It’s been a wonderful thing to reconnect with friends who are saying, “Good for you, you old dog! You’re back out there trying something new.” Because whenever someone says, “Oh, you’re a new realtor,” I say, “Well, I’m an old new realtor. I’m 61 and I’m starting this for the first time.” But it’s been great from that perspective and the support that you get from your friends. Then people are saying, “Oh, well, I know somebody who might be interested in sending you that information.” I think that’s one of the positive things that social media has done where we’ve been able to reconnect with so many people that we might have completely lost touch with.

Bunny: Oh yeah. I did a post not very long ago about how grateful I was, and it was in the middle of all the fear over Facebook and Twitter. And I just said that it’s such a great platform for reconnecting with cousins that I haven’t seen since I was six. I mean, I just turned 60. I’m an old dog and this is a new trick for me, but I think that if you use it the right way, it’s a real gift. I also think there are so many realtors, like you said, who just post either pictures of houses that they have listed or their accomplishments. And I think they’re really missing an opportunity.

Craig: Yeah. Because then you’re just talking at someone. You’re not sharing information and excitement about things with them. People don’t want to look at that stuff. They want to look at things like the fact that there are like six great chocolate tiers in Santa Fe. And then the next time I’m in town, I want to go to each one of them. Or discovering an amazing new hiking trail or a beautiful image of a shop window or a piece of art or something like that. 

Bunny: Yeah, it’s so much better than “I just listed this house at 123 main street. Don’t you wish you owned it?” Exactly.

Craig: Exactly. I think more people would react to it. I’d really like to have some of that green chili chocolate over at The Chocolate Smith or whatever. It’s much more interesting than a picture of a kitchen that has granite countertops. Oh my goodness.

Bunny: And, you know, Craig, I found that people will call me and they’ll say, “Well, I’ve been following you on Facebook for two years. And I feel like you’re my best friend. I think you’d be the right person to show me around and help me find a house.” And I bet that’s happening to you too.

Craig: Yeah, exactly. It’s funny, you mentioned that. One of the people I’ve been mentoring told me a story about how she posted a lovely picture of herself and then somebody called her and said, “I feel like I already know you because you just look like a nice person and I feel like I can trust you.” I think also that it’s our eyes and our smile and everything that conveys so much of what you’re talking about. If you have a spirit of gratitude and service and a sense of abundance, not scarcity, it shows in your face, your eyes, your smile, and your whole persona.

Bunny: Well, we’re going to have to wrap up here in a minute, but I would love to hear if you have just three great tips that you would give to somebody who feels kind of stuck in their marketing. It could be what you’ve learned in 30 years or in the last three days, whatever it is.

Craig: I think one is changing your question from “How do I market myself?” to “What can I do for this client?” or “What can I do that’s going to excite the people? How can I make them feel appreciated and valued?” And this can work in cases where you’re actually working one-on-one with a client or cases where you’re trying to figure out how to promote what you’re doing. How do I find ways to surprise and delight people? So I like to do that with social media buys, where you come up with quirky, little things to talk about that are authentically Santa Fe or a funny picture of my dog or something like that. You want to put a smile on people’s faces. And social media gives us so many opportunities to be able to do that in ways that we couldn’t before. So the main thing at the end of it is to put your client first, and then I think everything else will come from there.

Bunny: You’re absolutely right. I think as long as your passion is helping people, then success is just a natural by-product of that.

Craig: Exactly. People feel that energy and then they want to tell their friends about you.

Bunny: What I’ve found is that people want to be able to trust somebody, especially in this business where they’re making possibly the biggest purchase of their life.

Craig: Right? I’m thinking back to these younger clients. We were touring houses, and they were interested in one particular house and I was like, “No, I’m not going to let you buy this. This is not the right move.” And I think all of a sudden they’re like, “Wow, he really cares. He’s not just thinking ‘Tick tock, tick tock. We’ve seen three houses.’” This is not House Hunters International where there are the three properties and you have to buy one. So again, it’s not a transaction. It’s a journey. It’s a relationship.

Bunny: I think that’s the most important tip for somebody to take away. Whether you’re selling widgets or earrings or house cars or houses, this is not a transaction. It’s a relationship. We want people to trust you and come back over and over. I don’t know how you can love your job if you’re not doing it the way we’re doing it.

Craig: Yeah, exactly. And have fun with it. We get to meet interesting people all day long. We get to see things. We get to use our own creativity to express ourselves. I know there are people that are in jobs that don’t have that. But I also read things about  the janitor in an elementary school who takes real pride in what they do, and they are going to do the best job that they possibly can. So I think in almost everything, you can come at it with a mindset of “How can I make this a great experience for me and for others?”

Bunny: That’s great stuff. Tell us where people can find you and where they can find your blog.

Craig: Well, probably the most fun thing I’m doing is the Santa Fe Scenes blog. 

Bunny: Okay. And we’ll share that on the information page for the podcast. And then, of course, if people want to buy a house from you, they can find you through there?

Craig: Yeah. All my information is on there. So one stop shop.

Bunny: Craig, I’m so excited that you were here. This was fun. I think we could do it again.

Craig: Yeah. Yeah.

Bunny: Because I think this is the place where people get stuck. People who are self-employed get stuck in this part. And so I think there’s a lot of stuff that we can talk about.  But I’m of course really grateful that you agreed to talk with us.

Craig: Oh, thanks. It’s been a lot of fun. I appreciate it. 

Bunny: And to everybody else, thanks for being here. This is once again, the Lifesaving Gratitude podcast. I’m Bunny Terry. You are welcome to go to my website if you’d like to learn more about me and about buying my book, which is all about gratitude and how gratitude helped me kick stage four cancer’s ass. And we’d love to have you follow us and subscribe on spot Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks so much, Craig.

Craig: Thank you. Next time.