S2E378 Rules for Resilience - a Conversation with Valorie Burton

Summary

Podcast Summary

It’s a Good Life with Brian Buffini

Episode: S2E378 Rules for Resilience – a Conversation with Valorie Burton
Date: March 3, 2026
Guest: Valorie Burton, author and resilience expert
Theme: Practical strategies for building resilience, especially targeted to entrepreneurs and business professionals facing ongoing adversity.

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Episode Overview

Brian Buffini welcomes Valorie Burton to discuss her book, "Rules of Resilience." The conversation explores how entrepreneurs can develop the mental and emotional skills to weather life’s challenges, build inner strength, and seize opportunities. The episode delivers actionable insights and inspiration for listeners feeling "beat up" by recent tough years in business or life, providing practical guidance on becoming more resilient.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining Resilience

[03:55]

• Valorie Burton:

  “We often think of it as the ability to bounce back from a setback, but...it’s a personal system you create that enables you to weather whatever storms come and also to be able to seize opportunities.”

• Resilience isn’t just surviving adversity—it's also about being equipped to pursue bigger opportunities and challenges.

2. Resilience as a Personal System

[05:31] Valorie introduces the concept of resilience as a three-part system:

• Adaptive Skills (Internal):
  Your thought life, self-talk, beliefs, and attitudes.
• Protective Resources (External):
  Mentors, coaching, money, experiences, training, and relationships.
• Preventive Measures (Proactive Choices):
  Actions that reduce the likelihood or intensity of future challenges—like building relationships before you need them.

“If you can be more intentional about the choices you make... those choices prevent later struggle.” – Valorie Burton [06:51]

3. Key Adaptive Skills

[07:35]

• Thought Awareness:
  Learning to notice, interrogate, and replace unhelpful thoughts.
• Buffini shares his practice of contemplative prayer and the metaphor of “rotisserizing” negative thoughts (“ruminating”), asking how to break the cycle.

Valorie’s Practice:

• Write down persistent, even uncomfortable, thoughts.
• Ask: “Is this helping me or getting me stuck?”
• Replace with more helpful, realistic thoughts and reinforce them daily (sticky notes, reminders).

“You don’t necessarily control the thoughts that show up, but you do choose which ones you dwell on.” – Valorie Burton [07:47]

4. The Power of Vision vs. Obstacle Focus

[13:23]

• Buffini describes writing his life “backwards” by visualizing his obituary and daily actions to achieve that legacy.
• Valorie ties this to her rule: “Focus on the vision, not the obstacle.”

  “What we focus on feels bigger...and then we can’t even see the vision anymore.” – Valorie Burton [13:53]

5. Expect the Unexpected

[15:05]

• Resilience is rooted in realistic expectation that challenges will arise.
• Preparing for adversity reduces panic when it arrives.
• Also applies to unexpected opportunities that require new levels of resilience.

“If you expect the unexpected, then you prepare for it...when it happens, you go, ‘Oh, there’s one of the unexpecteds.’” – Valorie Burton [15:17]

6. Control What You Can, Accept the Rest

[16:38]

• Adopt an internal locus of control: focus energy on what you can change, acknowledge & accept what you cannot (e.g., economy, regulation).
• Prevents burnout, helplessness, and victim thinking.

“Control the controllable is you figure out which pieces you do control that actually have an impact on your outcome and accept the rest.” – Valorie Burton [17:40]

7. When to Grit and When to Quit

[19:18]

• Conventional wisdom says “never quit,” but quitting can be right if you’re on the wrong path or your season has changed.
• Valorie’s distinction: “Hard” feels challenging yet energizing if it aligns with your calling; “burdensome” means there’s no grace or energy.
• Importance of discernment and learning from quitting.

“When something is burdensome, you don’t have that grace on you to do it.” – Valorie Burton [20:02]

Buffini shares his transition from real estate to coaching as an example of quitting to something higher.

8. Grit for Younger Generations

[23:12]

• Buffini notes young professionals often quit too early, missing deeper lessons.
• Valorie stresses the value of sticking with goals aligned with calling: grit builds a foundation that pays off later, often after years of effort.

“Sometimes you got to get through a lot of hard, but...you’ll be so glad you didn’t quit.” – Valorie Burton [24:19]

9. Desired Outcomes for Readers

[25:44] Valorie hopes readers of "Rules of Resilience" will:

• Understand resilience as a system.
• Build a wiser, stronger, and more confident life, both professionally and personally.
• Develop a deep foundational strength that extends to all areas.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Thought Control:

  “You don’t necessarily control the thoughts that show up, but you do choose which ones you dwell on.” — Valorie Burton [07:47]

• On Self-Coaching Through Adversity:

  “If you knew the answer, what would it be?” — Valorie Burton [35:38]

• On Handling Setbacks:

  “If you’re tired of starting over, stop giving up.” — Valorie Burton [39:22]

• On Career Pivots:

  “It was almost like, what else can I do here? Because I felt this sense of call: impact and improve the lives and livelihoods of people.” — Brian Buffini [21:33]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Intro, Valorie’s Background: [00:02–04:48]
• Defining & Systematizing Resilience: [03:55–07:23]
• Top Adaptive Skills & Thought Awareness: [07:35–12:13]
• Focusing on Vision, Not Obstacles: [13:23–15:05]
• Expect the Unexpected: [15:05–16:30]
• Controlling the Controllable: [16:38–19:18]
• Grit vs. Quit: [19:18–24:37]
• Grit and Young Professionals: [24:37–25:44]
• Hopes for Readers: [25:44–26:48]
• Personal Affirmation (Like a Rock): [26:48–27:43]
• Rapid-Fire Personal Questions: [28:57–33:05]
  • Best advice received, gifts, favorite books, movies, definition of a good life.
• Audience Coaching Q&A with Anna Buffini: [33:19–39:55]

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Audience Q&A Highlights

1. What to Do When You Can’t See Forward?

[33:19]

• Get quiet and listen for inner wisdom; your intuition often has answers.
• Ask yourself: “If you knew the answer, what would it be?”
• Recognize the value of pausing before deciding in panic.

2. Fear of Starting Over/Taking Too Long

[36:37]

• Feelings are honest but not always truthful.
• Accept discomfort as part of starting over; focus on the new vision.
• Buffini notes the tendency to want to “get back to where I was” is unproductive; instead, use the past as a lesson and aim for an even better future.

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Closing Reflections

Valorie Burton’s resilience framework is holistic and actionable, combining self-awareness, proactive relationship-building, and acceptance of uncontrollables. Both she and Buffini ground their advice in personal experience, faith, and a belief in systems over willpower alone. Listeners are encouraged to build resilience not just for tough seasons, but as a foundation for growth, opportunity, and a more meaningful life.

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For Listeners Seeking Growth

If you're navigating business uncertainty, life transitions, or simply seeking more inner strength, this episode offers an empowering, practical toolkit for becoming…like a rock.

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Recommended action:
Explore Valorie Burton’s "Rules of Resilience" for detailed how-tos and start building your personal system of resilience today.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to It's a Good Life, the podcast for entrepreneurs where it's all about growing yourself and your business. Here's your host, founder of America's largest business coaching company, Brian Buffini. Well, the top of the morning to you and welcome to It's a Good Life. I'm Brian Buffini, your host and we have a guest for you today that I think is the perfect person at the perfect time. Her name is Valerie Burton and she's been studying and teaching on the topic of resilience for over two decades. And with everything that's been going on in the market in the last special three years that's been going on, I just feel like I've talked to so many people who they've been beat up, their cash reserves are lower. And even though the market's starting to turn and there's life in the market, they're thinking, should I get a job, Should I give up my career, Should I do this? Should I sell my brokerage, all that kind of good stuff. And I just think right now this message is the perfect time. If you feel a little beat up and you've had thoughts about giving up, this is the conversation for you. We all know that encountering adversity isn't an if, but it's a when. And today the goal is to equip you with practical how to's and a guide to getting better, wiser and stronger when life doesn't go according to plan. And so we'll be pulling insights from her brand new book. And I love this book. It's not just a great picture of her, but I love the coloring of the book. And of course, an Irishman loves this green. It's like that's why I have the Brian Buffini show right there with my cup. Valerie Barton, it's great to have you on as a guest. We really appreciate you making the time for us.

[B]

Oh, Brian, it's such an honor to get to talk to you today.

[A]

Well, you know, I find as a person who's natural bantas to teach and instruct, it's very rewarding to teach people when they really open to hear and listen. And right now the message you have, our audience is eyes wide open, ears wide open. I would imagine they're going to listen to this many times over. Maybe you can give us a little bit just for the audience that don't know you give a little bit of your background and how you ended up here today.

[B]

Well, this book around Rules of Resilience for me is a culmination of a long journey of work. It's not just the professional side, which is around positive psychology, the study of what happens when things go right with us, but it's also my own personal journey. And so, gosh, probably 16 or so years ago, 17 years ago, I had the opportunity to finish up grad school in positive psychology. I'd been coaching for some time at that point, but I had the opportunity to start teaching resilience in a military setting. Military was really realizing that physical fitness. Military fitness was important, but even more important is mental fitness. How do you deal with challenges as they come? And I happened to have that opportunity right as I was going through the most difficult challenge of my life, which was a divorce. And so it's like, oh, how do I apply what we're teaching here to my own life? We were in a recession back then, as you remember, and so it was really relevant. And I thought, when this recession is over, people won't. They won't be interested in resilience that much anymore. And it just never ended. And then we hit a pandemic.

[A]

Yeah, right.

[B]

And now we're on the other side of that. But as you know, particularly in real estate, this is a. This is an. It's an issue. We're always facing challenges, often unexpected ones, and we need to be ready to handle them. Not be surprised by them, but be ready to handle them.

[A]

So the book is great. It's called Rules of Resilience. It's just fantastic, and the perfect book for the perfect time. My two words for the year on the business side were patience and perseverance, which you could almost define that for me as resilience. How do you define resilience? What does that word mean to you? You've made this your life's work. What does it mean to you?

[B]

You know, I think we often think of it as the ability to bounce back from a setback, and that is a part of it. But in Rules of Resilience, I talk about it as a personal system you create that enables you to weather whatever storms come and also to be able to seize opportunities. Because we don't just need resilience to deal with challenges and difficulties. We need it when the opportunity is in front of us. But we've got to believe in ourselves in a bigger way or we've got to handle a higher level of stress or expectation. So resilience is necessary for success. And so understanding that this is a skill. Many of us have some degree of resilience, but it's a skill that we can actually grow and get better at that, helps us get better results. Whatever area of life we're talking about, whether it's your professional life or your personal life.

[A]

Well, one of the things we know as a coaching company, we're able to get a lot of results in a. You know, we were talking a little offline about our background and our average agent makes 10 times that of their peers and takes eight weeks off a year. And we've been doing that. We're doing this with tens of thousands of people. And one of the reasons is we have a system. We have a system. We teach on how to work by referral, but we also have a coaching system. One of the things that really attracted me to your work, Valerie, is you believe that resilience as a system. And I just think systems create that consistency, that dependability, and ultimately give you that piece like, hey, head and rear down. Do this and the results will come. So talk about resilience as a system.

[B]

Yeah, so what a system also does is it helps you diagnose, right. Where you could strengthen elements of your system that would lift you to the level where you need to be. And so I think this is super important. Our system is adaptive skills. This is the internal what's going on in your mind when you're faced with a stressor or a challenge? What are you saying to yourself? What is your attitude? What are your beliefs? Because that determines how you react to the challenge. The second part of that system is your protective resources. So whereas the adaptive is what's going on inside your protective resources are those external things you can call on to help you be more resilient. That ranges from mentors, right? Coaching as you do money makes us more resilient. Our experience, our training, it could be books, it could be access to those things, but it's the external things that you call on. And then third in that system is preventive measures. These are the proactive choices you make that actually reduce the likelihood that you're dealing with stressors and challenges in the first place. So this one is one I think we don't often think about. But if you can be more intentional about the choices that you make. And for example, you were just mentioning your system of how you're dealing with or getting more referrals. Well, it's a preventive choice when you're intentional about building those relationships in the first place. You're intentional even when business is going well, about meeting new people, because down the road showed those choices. Prevent later struggle because you've got a Bigger pool of people that help you to continue growing your business even when things get difficult. So the preventive choices are tremendous.

[A]

That's great. These adaptive skills. What would be some of the top adaptive skills? You're talking to somebody. I know you've coached a lot of highly successful people. What are the most important adaptive skills do you think to have?

[B]

Well, I would say the most important is thought awareness. In the midst of your challenge, what are you saying to yourself? And this is also the fastest one to change. So a lot of people think that they don't have control of their thoughts. And here's the thing, you don't necessarily control the thoughts that show up, but you do choose which ones you dwell on, which ones you embrace. So if you think of it almost like your mind has a door, right? So, and so you either have the door wide open and thoughts like, I'm not going to be able to weather this storm. I'm not going to be able to deal with this economy like my business is, you know, it's just going to go the way of everyone else's. If those are the thoughts, those thoughts are going to determine what you do or what you don't do. But if you think of it as a. As a door, you can close that door, you can lock that door, you can look through the peephole and go, okay, I know this thought showed up, but is it a good one for me? And so when you become aware of what you're saying to yourself, you can actually decide whether you keep repeating the thought or you say, hey, what might be a more helpful thought? Yeah, things are, my goodness, I wish they weren't the way they are, but they are.

[A]

My wife's one of our favorite verses to hold every thought captive.

[B]

That's exactly what I'm talking about. So I can choose. Hmm. Things are hard right now, but I've done hard things before. I can actually get through this. So you start saying different things to yourself, which result in different choices, different actions.

[A]

So I have a high revved motor. You probably picked up on that just talking to me. But I'm the million thoughts. And you know, I'm an analytic little person too, right. I was trained and to be an actuary, right? So I go fast, I have a lot of thoughts, and I'm systematic about processing them. And again, you can drive yourself crackers doing that. So one of the practices I learned a number of years ago was contemplative prayer, where I ultimately learned to become unattached to it. You know what I Mean, just like what I have communicated to people in the past is we have a tendency to, like, rotisserize thoughts. Like, got a rotisserie chicken on the spit and we roast it over, and it's like, somebody did you wrong and you wrote over and over again. Or somebody did something bad and you wrote over and over again. And, you know, whatever the frustration or hurt or whatever the fear is, and we rotisserize the thought. What would be a technique or something you would help somebody with? How to turn off the rotisserie and move on to, you know, whatever's noble, whatever's good. How do I think about the pleasant stuff and kind of replace the one that's. That's haunting me?

[B]

Yeah. Psychologists call it ruminating. We can get stuck ruminating, especially on the negative. So it takes practice. It's not that we change our thoughts with replacing it one time. It's over and over again. So one of the most important things you can do is pause and be aware. What am I saying to myself? Coach yourself with that question. What am I saying? Write it down. Write down the most persistent thought. Write down the thoughts you don't even want to admit you're having. So that you're saying, yeah, I am saying this. Yeah, this thought keeps coming up. A lot of times there are thoughts of fear, thoughts of anxiety, which is fear of dangers on the horizon. Just notice everything you're saying to yourself not to beat yourself up, but so that you have that information and you can now be intentional. Are those thoughts helping me or getting me stuck? If they're getting me stuck, what would be a more helpful thought? You literally start listing those thoughts. It might be one that you start saying to yourself. If you struggle even to get the one thought, ask your coach. Ask your friend who's always, you know, the more they're realistic, but they're also positive. Right. Be intentional about finding the thought, and then keep it in front of you. It might be a reminder that pops up on your phone every day. It might be one that you stick with a sticky note on your laptop or on your mirror. Because when you begin practicing it over time, this becomes your new thought. But you've got to persevere in practicing. And so I think that's a really important piece because a lot of times we struggle with changing thoughts, and if we don't change them right away, we think, oh, I can't do this. That's another thought. Hmm, I can't do this yet. But if I keep practicing, I can. So noticing again, being aware of what you're saying and being intentional. And I'm telling you, it works. We know you've been quoting scripture around it. Science proves it out. It works.

[A]

Yeah, the classic James Allen's as a man thinketh, right? I mean, one of the great personal growth books of the early 1900s. And one of the problems I see today. Let's say you're having certain thoughts. Well, as we all know, our phones all work off the algorithms of what we search and what we're interested in. So now you get on social media, or you're scrolling and now you get to, you know, ruminate over and over and over again on the same thing. And so I think it's very important what I find myself is when I get on this path, I actually physically change something. I'll actually, okay, like the phone is no longer in the bedroom. Boom, that's out in the morning. I'm going for a walk. Okay, I'm changing up the playlist. I listen to or I'm doing something different to engage. And then I'm starting to think about what I want to be about. You know, one of the things I've done lately is write my life backwards, right? Which is here's my obituary today, and here's what my kids and family are saying at my funeral today. And here's the ultimate. And what does that look like? And it may sound a little negative, but it's like, hey, I'm, you know, this is the legacy I want to leave. And I'm thinking about that legacy and what do I need to do on a day to day basis to create that legacy?

[B]

And that's exactly what we're talking about here with the thoughts. You've tapped into multiple rules and rules of resilience. So one is choose thoughts that strengthen you, and that takes intention. But another, this is one of my favorites is focus on the vision, not the obstacle. That obituary you mentioned is the vision. Ultimately, where am I trying to go? It's very easy for us to get stuck when we see an obstacle. And obstacles are inevitable, even if we don't know which ones are going to pop up. But we start staring at the obstacle, focusing on the obstacle, ruminating on the obstacle. As you said, the obstacle becomes like that rotisserie chicken. What we focus on feels bigger, it gets bigger, it expands, and then we can't even see the vision anymore. So you've got to look up at where am I ultimately trying to go. It puts your obstacles into perspective. It gives you direction for what next step is going to get you closer to that vision.

[A]

We're talking in the coaching floor here. A lot of times the coaches use a phrase. Your obstacle is the mouse with the megaphone. You know, it's this obstacle, and you've, you know, you've literally. We turn molehills into mountain, and then there's emotion around it, and then overwhelm kicks in and all those kind of things. And so, again, as I Look at, there's 10 principles in rules of resilience. Choose the thoughts that strengthen you, I think is one of my favorites. Another one, which is kind of like where you start is this concept that everybody's heard about, but I think you have a fresh spin on it, which is expect the unexpected. How do you prepare for adversity without living in fear of it?

[B]

So this is the foundational rule of resilience. Expect the unexpected, and you've got to be ready to handle it. All of us know that we have oftentimes set a goal and we've got our little plan. And in our optimistic minds, we think we're going to go to A to Z. It's going to be a nice line. We've already planned it out. You already know that that doesn't typically happen. So if you expect the unexpected, then you prepare for it. You don't have to know exactly what it's going to be, but when the unexpected happens, you go, oh, there's one of the unexpecteds. And you don't have to panic over it. You don't have to get upset about it. Stop. Keep getting stressed. Oh, my gosh, this is so awful. This is the path you've chosen, and there's going to be unexpected things that happen, and it gives you this sense of confidence and direction. My goal is to be resilient here. We need this for the unexpected negatives that occur, but we also need it for the unexpected opportunities that come along, because we need resilience in order to be successful.

[A]

That's interesting. I never thought about having a goal to be more resilient, but that's actually. We set goals to be thinner or stronger or richer or whatever, but I've never heard a goal to be more

[B]

resilient, because if you're not, at some point, you're going to be stopped on the way to the goal, and you're not going to be able to overcome it.

[A]

Another great principle, again, a principle I've heard many times. I think you have a fresh take on it, which is control the controllable and accept the rest.

[B]

Talk to us about that oh, one of my favorites. So this really taps into this idea of an internal versus an external locus of control. And we know the most successful people, the most resilient people, have an internal locus of control, meaning when something happens, they don't over focus on the things beyond their control. So if we look in the real estate industry, for example, you don't control interest rates, you don't control government regulation, you don't inventories. Yeah, the economy. Right. You don't control inventories. You might wish you could, you might wish things were different, but if you over focus on that, you end up feeling like a victim of everything that happens. When you have an internal locus of control, you go, okay, these are the circumstances. This is what it is. It is what it is. What do I control? I control how disciplined I am every day. I control the plan that I have. I control my attitude. I control how well I serve my clients, how I follow through. I control how much I continue my own personal growth so that I can be resilient in this process until things get better, the uncontrollables get better. So control the controllable is you figure out which pieces do you control that actually have an impact on your outcome and accept the rest. Doesn't mean you approve of means it is what it is and you accept that that's where it is right now and that there are certain things you don't control and you're not going to spend your energy, waste your energy really on those things.

[A]

One of my affirmations is it's kind of actually one of my pre game routines before I go on stage is I relax and do my best and trust God for the rest. And that's one of my affirmations. And these things are very powerful. Right. It does set the standard and it creates freedom. Like it's like, okay, I mean, at the end of the day, all we can do is our best, right? I mean, and my goal is to grow as a person so my best becomes more, but I can't do more if I'm not more personally. And so I think those are three great ones. Expect the unexpected. Choose thoughts that strengthen you and control the controllable and accept the rest. You had the privilege of studying under Angela Duckworth, who wrote the book Grit. And that kind of led you down the path to the rules of resilience. When to grit and when to quit was one of the things that stood out. How can we tell the difference between gritting it out and, and sinking? You know, it's like sometimes there is a time to give it up. Right. And move on.

[B]

Yeah. I think most of us, as we're growing up, are told, winners never quit, quitters never win, never give up. There's the famous Churchill quote, never, never, never, never give up. Right. And so the idea of quitting or giving up can feel like the worst thing a successful person can do. But here's the thing. Sometimes you're not quite on the right path. And so you need to understand when sometimes you need to course correct. Sometimes you made a bad decision. Other times you were doing something for a season, and that season is over. And so you've got to be discerning, know when to grit, know when to stick with it, and know when to quit. One of the. One of the ways I have discovered that's, for me, very helpful from a spiritual and faith perspective is the difference between something being hard and something being burdensome. So when it's hard, we tend to have the grace to do it. And doing something hard can even feel energizing. If you're going through this, you know, this is the business you're supposed to have, you know, you're supposed to be successful at it. Yes, it's hard, and yes, you can muster up the energy, the resources, the people, the team to be able to do it. But when something is burdensome, you don't have that grace on you to do it. And you might have had the grace five years ago, but there's something new, something different for you to do. So it's really important to discern between those two and understand that sometimes quitting is a good decision. And understanding that and I think really embracing it and saying, hey, what's the lesson here? And how do I move on with ease, I think is extraordinarily important.

[A]

Yeah. And quitting to something is also very important to me. It's sometimes. It's just like there's a season of life. I mean, I thought I would sell real estate my whole life. I mean, my phrase was your personal realtor for life. That was on my business cards. And, you know, I still have clients that give me grief over that, you know, because I've been 30 years in the coaching business, and I loved it. I loved everything about it. I had a sense of calling. I had a sense of calling. And my life, I think if I'd have stayed in real estate, my life in many ways have been a hell of a lot simpler. You know, I've traveled. I've been on the road a lot. I built a very complex business that has you know, its own set of burdens and a much greater economic burden and pressure and all that kind of good stuff. But it was almost like, what else can I do here? Because I felt this sense of call, impact and improve the lives and livelihoods of people. That was my thing. And, you know, I was just in Boston. I was speaking at a conference there and had the great pleasure of being joined by a bunch of clients who've been with me 25 years or more. There's a bunch of these people, and it's like they raised their family with us. They, you know, they built their families and businesses around these principles and came to all of our events and so on, so forth. And it's like, you know, that's the good stuff, right? And that was what all the. That's what all the nights away from home were about. That's my bride and I were aligned in that. And so I had to, if you will, quit real estate to go do the higher and bigger calling. Not that selling real estate is not a bigger calling. It's just for me and who I'm made to be. That's what I was supposed to do. And So I trained 4 million realtors instead of helping 100 homeowners a year. It became a different thing. So, again, I think you have to learn. You have to understand. I do think, though, I really am in many ways an admirer of the younger generations, but one of the things I see consistently is they seem to quit early and they seem to quit before they've learned the lesson. So what the flip advice is, what are the benefits of gritting it out that people need to take on, especially young people?

[B]

So grit is passion and perseverance for goals of meaning, right? So it's so important that we understand our unique, as you say, calling. What are you meant to be doing? Because I could ask you the coaching question, you know, what's. What's the right next step? And then I could say, what's the right next step for you? Because you could have all of your realtors lined up and there's a different answer for each person. Oftentimes we're looking to everybody else to figure out, what should I be doing? You've got to get quiet to understand your own journey. And once you're in that journey, you're going to have the grace to do the things that you need to do. And yes, sometimes those things are really, really hard. And it's about a decision to keep going and it'll be worth it. But sometimes you got to get through a lot of hard, but because you stuck with it, you've built a foundation. And when you hit that moment where all of that stuff accumulates like a snowball, you'll be so glad you didn't quit because then things actually start to get a bit easier. But sometimes that's a multi, multi year journey and that's okay. That's a part of the learning, that's a part of the growth. But you've got to get clear about your own purpose and why you're doing what you're doing.

[A]

The average Gen Z time on job is under six months before they shift. And so that's one of the dynamics. And I keep saying like, like a lot of these younger people come to me and I'm like, you know, I think you're great, I think you're talented. I have a concern, you know, you stayed five months here and four months there and six months there. And here's the thing, I'm going to invest a lot of money and time into you to become part of our team. So what's my concern is you haven't stuck it out very long anywhere else and now you carry that with you. And many of the young folks, their peers are like, yeah, you know, you got to find that purpose and you got to do. And sometimes your purpose is just to have a job. Sometimes your purpose is when you're younger is to learn a lot and to grind it through and sometimes it's to find out what you don't want, you know, so I'm all with that, but that's one of my concerns and that's why I think this book is very important. Let me ask you this question, Valerie, because we have just a huge audience that love to read. What do you hope people go on this journey of this rules of resilience? What do you want them to experience? Do you want to have coming out the other side?

[B]

I think most importantly is strengthening, first of all, understanding that personal system of resilience that I described. And then as a result building a life that is better than they thought it could be, where they are stronger than they've ever been and they're wiser. When you gain the wisdom of resilience, in other words, you are, you're gleaning the message out of the things that you've been through. Life actually gets better and it becomes easier for it to get better. You're building this stronger foundation. And the exciting thing to me is yes, this is going to apply and help you when it comes to your work and your finances. But it's also going to make you better physically with your health, in your relationships, in your family, because you actually are building a stronger support system that supports everything, every element of your vision. And ultimately, I think a lot of confidence comes from building up that kind of level of resilience.

[A]

You know the song that I played to myself in the car, I'm not a big country music guy or whatever, but I there. And he's not really a country artist. Dan Fogarty, he had a song called Like a Rock and when I'm under it, I'll play that song in the car and it's like, hey, right now the waves are crashing in, but the waves are going to recede, the tide is going to go out and I'm going to be standing here like a rock and I'll play that song for myself. Like, I've just had a brutal day at the office and everything that could go did go wrong. And I'm just, I'll put that song on repeat and I'll just be singing along like a rock and I go, the waves are going to recede. There's a good chance tomorrow won't look like today. But that's my little affirmation to myself. So I'm all down with this.

[B]

You know what that is, Brian? That's you practicing your adaptive skills. It's like when you turn on the rocky theme song and all of a sudden you feel like you can conquer the world. That changes your thoughts and your whole attitude.

[A]

I love because I'm a doer and sometimes I just need to be a beer, you know what I mean?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And so I always think about, you know, we have a place over in Hawaii and I think about those lava rocks and I go for this hike and the waves come pounding in. Every time I'm there, like 100 years from now, these rocks are going to be standing. I'm going to be pushing up Daisy somewhere, you know, and I just, I want to be more like that rock, you know, on March 17th, which is St. Patrick's Day, Valerie we celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the launch of this podcast and we're very excited because we have a brand new. We are reimagining re envision this whole show. So we're very, very excited to let folks know about that. The other piece to that puzzle is we're going to feature some of the best of the best we've had over the years. And I think this is just some great stuff. And during this 10 year period of Time. I've asked every guest that I've had on the show these five questions, and it's just a way for folks to get a little different insight to you and what you're all about and how you work. And so they're on this journey with me for 10 years, many of these folks, and it's all of a sudden it's like, oh, this is. It just gives this insight because this is their frame of reference. Okay, so here's the first question I have for you, Valerie Burton. What is the single best piece of advice you've ever been given?

[B]

It came from a mentor many years ago, before I started writing books. And he said, do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life. I didn't understand what he meant at the time, but I sure was intrigued by it.

[A]

Right. And again, that's a quote that a lot of people take all kinds of different sides on it, but it's. It doesn't mean that it's going to be easy. You know, we're doing what I love to do what I do, and it's hard most of the time.

[B]

It's hard what I do, but I'm in my strengths.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Comes naturally.

[A]

Yeah, you're in your sweet means I'm

[B]

doing something that is. That I do love. I love it naturally.

[A]

Yep. God gave you these gifts, and then you're using those gifts. My prayer is, I want to use the gifts God's given me. God's way. That's my. Because I know how to use God's gifts. And sometimes I use it Brian's way, which the Irish Brian version is not great. What's the one talent or gift you wish you possess that you currently don't?

[B]

I'm grateful for a lot of the gifts that I have, but the one that I've worked on a lot. So I've taken the strengths finder. It's the strengths assessment that Gallup has. And I have strengths envy around the strength of activator. That's people that as soon as they get idea, they. They run with it. But I'm very strategic. I think a lot. And I have to keep myself from overthinking. Right. My husband. My husband's straight activator. And sometimes I have to go, jeff, it was just an idea. Don't run with it yet. Let's talk about it. He's like, what? It was a great idea. Let's go.

[A]

Yep. You know, opposites attract. My mentor, Lou hall, says, opposites attract and then attack what book has been most instrumental in your life.

[B]

Oh, without question, the Bible.

[A]

Well, what character then? What character do you identify with in the Bible then?

[B]

You know my favorite book, Gosh, there's. It's a tie between Proverbs and James, but James is short, so it's easy to keep going back to it. So I would probably say that the book of James, I think it just teaches so much around perseverance and what we.

[A]

Yeah. Consider it all joy. When you face trials of various kinds times, know that the testing of your faith will make you complete and lacking in nothing. Right.

[B]

Good.

[A]

Perseverance. Let's say you're scrolling through the channels. You're probably busy, lady. You don't get to do that too often. But there's a movie on, and every time it's on, you stop and watch it. What's the one movie you watch over and over and over again?

[B]

Oh, goodness.

[A]

Or even parts of it.

[B]

So my favorite movie of all time isn't like. It's not like a funny movie, but my favorite movie all time is the Color Purple.

[A]

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

[B]

You're gonna laugh at the one I would watch because it's a kids. It's a kids movie.

[A]

What's that?

[B]

I see all the characters, and I'm trying to remember.

[A]

It's the movie about all the emotions inside out. Is that the one?

[B]

Thank you. Multiple versions of it. And so me and our kids have watched it multiple times, and I think it's because of my positive psychology, background love. They took a movie with animated characters aimed at kids to help them identify emotions and recognize, just like us as adults, you can choose them very intentionally so that probably wasn't what you were expecting.

[A]

No. That's great. That's. I haven't heard that one. But for your background, that makes perfect sense that you would love that movie. Last but not least, Valerie Burton. What does a good life mean to you?

[B]

For me, the good life means being able to know that I have shown up in the way, in a way that I'm proud of, that I've persevered through the hard stuff, but more importantly, that the people who know me best are also proud of who I am. My personal mission statement is to create and enjoy a fulfilling, prosperous, and generous life and to inspire others to do the same. So every day, that vision is on my wall, and I try to just live by that. But the biggest compliment is when other people go, yeah, that's actually who she is.

[A]

That's great. Love it. Here's my daughter, Anna, One of The six Kids. Anna's an international horse rider and has represented America all over the world. But now she's come to work for dad and is helping with a bit of the social media. Here she is.

[B]

Wow. Thank you both for such great content surrounding resilience. I'm Anna Buffini and I'm so excited to jump into this conversation because it really lends itself so well to a new segment we'll be debuting on the Brian Buffini show beginning March 17th. This segment is called Coach Em up. And as you both know, coaching can be the biggest difference between a huge win and never reaching your goals. I'm coming from a professional athletic career personally, and my coach changed my life forever and helped create my success. You're both such proven voices in this field and have helped coach people to real wins. So we wanted to field a few questions from the audience and have you both coach them up. The first question lends directly to coaching. She asks, when you're in the middle of adversity and can't see forward, what steps do you recommend? So I think first step is get quiet. I think when we can't see forward, we have a tendency maybe to panic. A lot of times we're so busy asking everybody else what we should do. We have a lot of wisdom inside of us, but we often don't pause to ask very simple questions. One of the simplest coaching questions I've often asked people when I'm shocked when they answer, but they always do, is, so if you knew the answer, what would it be? And they'll just come back and say, oh, well, I would do such and such and such and such, because in the back of your head there's, you've got. Your intuition's telling you something and often we will ignore it. I think it's also important to ask, what do I need right now? Sometimes what you need is just a little break, some downtime. Your nervous system is all worked up and you just, maybe you need a walk, maybe you need a nap, maybe you need a day off, right? And in that calm, what your next step should be or who you might go to, that might be a good mentor, it will bubble up, but one of the most important things is that you don't jump to making decisions out of fear. A lot of times when we kind of feel like we've got sideswiped into a ditch, you know, you hit your head, you're seeing stars, that's not the time to get up and try to run. You're probably going to fall over. So One of the best things that you can do is to just give yourself time to pause. That's when you recollect your thoughts and then you get your answer around how you move forward.

[A]

That's great. You know, one of the questions we ask in coaching a lot is because it's easy to give people advice, but we can't see our own stuff. And so we'll often reverse it and say, let's say I was in your exact situation and you were just giving me advice. What would you tell me to do? And it's boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And the reason for the paralysis is, yeah, but in my case. And you get the all the emotional attachment, right? When we give advice, there's no emotional attachment to a person's problem. So we can see clearly. And so again, very similar to what you're talking about, value coaches will ask somebody, you know, give me that. What? What is it? I mean, let's say I'm in your spot. Tell me what to do. What would you do? And it's amazing. And like you say, that wisdom is inside. A lot of times we find in coaching people, we're trying to pull it out instead of put it in. It's like a piece of blotting paper as opposed to filling up somebody's cup. So that's a good one. What else you got, Anna?

[B]

Next up, we have a real estate agent who asks a question more in line with resiliency. She says, I worry that it will feel like starting over and it will take too long. So what I'm curious about is what's so bad about feeling like it's starting over? Right? So a lot of times we allow our emotions to make decisions for us, and that's not always the best option. Our emotions. One of my. Well, the first person I learned coaching from, Thomas Leonard, who's kind of the founder of modern life coaching, and he passed not long after I had that opportunity. He would say, you know, that our emotions are honest, but they're not necessarily the truth. So, yes, you feel like I'll be starting over, and maybe you do feel that way. Does that mean that you shouldn't move forward with starting over? So if you would expect the unexpected, control the controllable, and accept that it's gonna feel like you don't wanna feel, but that is what it is, and you can move through it. You can handle feeling that way and still do what you need to do. Your feelings don't need to dictate your actions.

[A]

That's great. That's Great. What I hear in that question, Anna, is somebody who's talking about, oh, it's going to take too long to do what? And that's a loaded question, because that person's really saying, I want to get back to where I was. And so they've gone through circumstance in life. They've gone through change. And it's, I want to get back to where I was. And that's the human nature. You know, I mean, I always bring up the Shawshank Redemption and the librarian named Brooks hadlan, who, after 50 years of imprisonment, can't handle the freedom. And he wants to get back. I just want to get back where things make sense, is what he says. And so we all want to go like homing pigeons, back to what we know. The real key is how can I learn from what has been and create a new vision of where I want to be? And, I mean, I had a conversation just last week with a guy. He's been married five times. He keeps marrying the same woman. And I said to him, dude, she might not be the problem here. You know what I mean? You keep doing the same thing over and over again, right? The definition of insanity. And the real thing is, what's the lesson from the past? And then what's the vision for the future? And I think what I hear in that question is someone is, oh, I'm in this situation. It's going to take too long. Too long to do what? I'm starting over. I want to get back to where I was. Well, maybe where you were wasn't that great a place. And so take the best of it, but create the new vision going forward. Going back is not always the best plan.

[B]

Yeah, that's so good. Brian, I have one more thing to add to what you said that I thought of as you were talking. For this person that's asked, if you're tired of starting over, stop giving up. Something that I heard years ago at a point where I was needing to start my life over. And sometimes, especially when we talk about careers, we want things to happen quickly. Don't give up. Keep going. Because your breakthrough is probably just on the other side of you not giving up.

[A]

That's great. Well, this has been fun. I hope you got what you needed there, daughter. And, Valerie, we always finish off our little podcast here with an Irish blessing. My mother, her voice was on the podcast for nine and a half years. She passed last year at 94 years of age, God bless her, back in Dublin. And we always finish with a little Irish blessing because her dad when we were kids, would line us up as kids, give us a little shot of whiskey and say the Irish blessing. So what's great about being Irish? You're six years old, you're doing shots with your grandfather. It's just. We just have a better life than everybody else. So I'm. I'll finish our time today with our little Irish blessing. May the roads rise up to meet you and may the wind always be at your back? May the rain fall soft upon your fields and the sunshine warm upon your face. On. Until we meet again. May God hold us all in the hall of his hand. We'll see you next time.