The Best Lessons Learned from Partnership Breakups and Fitness Transformations with Christopher Nicolaysen

Summary

Podcast Summary: Maximum Lawyer Episode: The Best Lessons Learned from Partnership Breakups and Fitness Transformations with Christopher Nicolaysen
Release Date: December 3, 2024
Host: Tyson Mutrux
Guest: Christopher Nicolaysen

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1. Introduction

In this episode of Maximum Lawyer, Tyson Mutirux welcomes Gretchen Nicholas to engage in a deep and introspective conversation with Christopher Nicolaysen. The discussion delves into significant personal and professional experiences, including a partnership breakup and transformative fitness journeys.

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2. Fitness Transformation and Overcoming Body Dysmorphia

Christopher opens up about his recent fitness transformation, highlighting his battle with body dysmorphia and his journey towards better nutrition and physical health.

• Struggle with Body Image:
  "I think I've had this weird, like, sense of body dysmorphia in the sense of, like, never knowing how poorly I looked... looking in the mirror now, maybe not knowing how good I look today." (02:09)

• Commitment to Nutrition:
  "I wanted to get serious about nutrition because I've always been told that's the real switch." (03:08)

• Professional Approach to Fitness:
  Christopher emphasizes his data-driven mindset, focusing on measurable results rather than just following trendy workout programs.

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3. The Importance of the "Boring Stuff" in Business Growth

Christopher discusses the significance of mundane yet essential business practices that drive long-term growth.

• Learning from Successful Entrepreneurs:
  "But I think it goes back to the way you were saying... it's the boring stuff that we need each day that I think actually really pay dividends." (05:13)

• Case Study Insights:
  He references Andrew Wilkinson's journey from a barista to a billionaire, emphasizing the value in acquiring traditional businesses like laundromats and dry cleaners instead of chasing trendy ventures.

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4. Sustainability in Fitness Programs

The conversation shifts to the sustainability of fitness programs, contrasting "sexy" initiatives like 75 Hard with more sustainable practices.

• Views on 75 Hard:
  "It's not something you try. It's just a thing you do for this period." (07:00)

• Balancing Intensity and Sustainability:
  Christopher shares his experience of completing 75 Hard multiple times and finding the need to balance intense programs with more sustainable fitness routines afterward.

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5. Personal Habits: Taking a Break from Alcohol

Christopher reveals his personal history with alcohol, shaped by his parents' struggles, and how he has managed his drinking habits.

• Family Influence:
  "I have two parents that are alcoholics... my dad died from it in some form or another." (10:05)

• Current Approach to Drinking:
  "I'd rather at times have a glass of bourbon instead of having like dessert... That is the treat." (11:29)

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6. Partnership Breakup: Experiences and Lessons Learned

A significant portion of the discussion revolves around Christopher’s recent partnership breakup, exploring the emotional and business-related aspects.

• Initial Realizations:
  "I think it was probably after my partner stopped taking cases... he struggled with an identity shift." (21:55)

• Lessons on Communication and Contracts:
  "There's no such thing as a contract that's too short... We should have had some really honest conversations from the get-go." (29:16)

• Blame Dynamics in Partnerships:
  Christopher introduces the three levels of blame:

  1. Phase One: Blaming the other person.
  2. Phase Two: Blaming oneself as the leader.
  3. Phase Three: No blame, accepting it as a part of the journey.
     "Phase three... it's just a thing that happened and people move on." (26:37)

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7. The Nature of Friendships and Personal Circles

The discussion extends to the depth of personal relationships and the importance of fostering meaningful friendships.

• Inner vs. Outer Circles:
  "There's probably only three people in my life that I really like, really know, and it's my wife and my two girls." (32:19)

• Intentional Friendship Building:
  Christopher reflects on the quality over quantity of friendships, emphasizing deeper connections over superficial ones.

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8. Teaching Background and Transition to Law

Christopher shares his transition from teaching to law, highlighting how unexpected career shifts can lead to fulfilling opportunities.

• Abrupt Career Change:
  "We were non-renewed in the same year... we decided to go to law school." (43:52)

• Gratitude for the Shift:
  "I'm so glad I'm actually not a teacher anymore because of the lifestyle that I have." (45:01)

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9. Mindset: From Unrealistic Optimism to Action-Oriented Thinking

The conversation delves into the concept of mindset, differentiating between mere positive thinking and actionable optimism.

• Unrealistic Optimism vs. Practical Action:
  "It's the idea of, like, what else are you going to do? Am I going to have a pity party?" (55:00)

• Learning Through Failure:
  Christopher discusses how repeated failures led him to adopt a more resilient and action-focused mindset.
  "Three years of failing... something just hits." (58:58)

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10. Viewing Partnership as Success Rather than Failure

Christopher reframes the narrative around his partnership breakup, focusing on the successes and positive outcomes rather than the negatives.

• Valuing Experiences:
  "Those pieces are pockets of memories that I have that were huge successes." (59:51)

• Business Achievements Post-Breakup:
  "Being an attorney who owns a law firm who has been able to fully transition out of having a caseload... How can I assist?" (60:48)

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Notable Quotes

• On Nutrition and Fitness:
  "I wanted to get serious about nutrition because I've always been told that's the real switch." (03:08)

• On Handling Blame:
  "Phase three... it's just a thing that happened and people move on." (26:37)

• On Mindset and Action:
  "It's not something you try. It's just a thing you do for this period." (07:00)

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Conclusion

This episode offers a profound exploration of personal growth, business acumen, and the intricate dynamics of professional partnerships. Christopher Nicolaysen shares invaluable insights from his own experiences, providing listeners with actionable lessons on resilience, intentionality, and the importance of the often-overlooked "boring stuff" that drives success.

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Timestamp References:

• 02:09
• 03:08
• 05:13
• 07:00
• 09:56
• 10:05
• 11:29
• 12:19
• 21:55
• 26:37
• 29:16
• 32:19
• 35:32
• 43:52
• 45:01
• 55:00
• 58:58
• 59:51
• 60:48

Note: The timestamps correspond to moments in the provided transcript where key points and notable quotes are discussed.

Transcript

[Tyson Mutrix]

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[Christopher Nicholas]

This is maximum Lawyer with your host, Tyson Mutrix.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Today I sit down with my really good friend Christopher Nicholas. And it's always a pleasure sitting down with Chris. He's a very kind, introspective person. So every time I talk to him, you get a pretty deep conversation. And this one, he was very open. We got to talk about his partnership breakup. We talk about doing hard things, which he and I both think is a really important thing. We talk about him become a lawyer later on in life. We talk about trading hours for years, even business travel tips. We talk about taking ownership and going out on your own. And we end it with being mindful and intentional. It's a. It's a really interesting conversation. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did, and I hope you get a lot out of it because it's a really great episode. Welcome.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Thanks.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Good to see you. You look great.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Thank you.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I want to know more about that because we talked a little bit about it. I want to hear, like, what are you doing? Because you look fantastic from the last time I saw you. You look like you've dropped, like, 20 pounds. You've put on, like, 15 pounds of muscle.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. So I think for the first time in my life. So I've gone to the gym a lot in the past, so for me it was, like, trying to figure out nutrition. And so I think I've had this weird, like, sense of, like, body dysmorphia in the sense of, like. Like never knowing how poorly I looked. Like when I looked in the mirror at the time.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

To where now Looking in the mirror now, maybe not knowing how good I look today, but. So what I tried to do was.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Oh, real Quick though, before you get to.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

What. Explain that more like how, how poorly you look back.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So like whenever I saw you last, right, so like six months ago or what have you, it was. I was probably about 185 to 190. And so for somebody my size, when I got measured recently, I'm about. I'm officially like five, seven and a half. I think I'm slowly shrinking.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Get that half. I'm with you.

[Christopher Nicholas]

And then it's. It's one of those things where at that time that weight for me is probably not something that really. Where I. Where I should be. If it's, if it's not just all muscle.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

But at the time I'm like, yeah, I'm pretty good, you know, so I'm that size, wearing larges, things like that. And then told myself though, look, I've done all the different, like workout programs through most of the online trainers that you can meet or what have you. That stuff I know how to do. I've gone to the gym, I know certain workouts, what have you. Still don't necessarily know the difference between the snatch and the whatever else. The flip up. I don't know. There you go. But. So I wanted to get serious about nutrition because I've always been told that that's the, the real switch. So I had a friend of mine that I knew over at the gym, he was a coach there, reached out to him. He's a bit older than me, but his physique is pretty like kind of where I wanted to get to. And so I ended up reaching out to him and worked out with him for about 90 days.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

What's interesting to me, because it does seem to me like you are more data driven. So it's just surprising you would not have adopted this sooner.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, maybe it's just more like data ish driven. I think the ish is probably the thing sounds, you know, like the numbers. I like the result. So the end thing. But it's the chunk in the middle that gets a little, A little annoying.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Like. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I always think of, because I just make it simple like with the process goals, product goals, like Jason Stock.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

It's like that the in between. We do focus a lot on the end, but it's really the most important part is like that the middle, the.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Boring stuff day to day. Right. Like, I think it's just the idea of, you want this idea of like what I would call like sexy food or you want, you know, enjoyable, you know, that umami, you want all of that like as you eat, eating like what is it? A rice cake with peanut butter on it may not have that same umami of eating like really good sushi or whatever else. Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you talked about the boring stuff. So I want to get into the boring stuff. You were talking about a guy you were following. Tell me more about the boring stuff and because I want to ask you about related to the law firm things and you're talking about making money the boring way. So tell, tell me what you were talking about there.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So like, so the boring stuff in regards to like just how to make money.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Exactly. Right?

[Christopher Nicholas]

Oh yeah. So just this pod recently though that I'm listening to. So it's a deep dive. So it's Ali Abdullah's deep dive and he just had. His name's Andrew Wilkinson I believe at least in a quick look up on him. He's. He went from being a barista to becoming a billionaire. Obviously it didn't happen overnight through time. And he's talking about the idea too though that like most people think they want to be a billionaire, but like the reality is you don't really want to be a billionaire. He's like there's a sweet spot of like 20 million, 20 to 30 million where it's actually a really good spot to be. He goes, but he's like, he goes when you look at it because he acquires businesses. And so we were talking too about like Cody Sanchez who does it. She doesn't buy like the new influencer type sexy business. It's the mom and pop shops, it's the laundromats or the dry cleaners or the parking lots. Right. And that's the boring stuff because the boring things make money. But I think it goes back to the way you were saying though. So like even with, in order to get fit or to grow a business, it's the boring stuff that we need each day that I think actually really in a. Paying the dividends.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Interesting. And I'm going to summarily this back to the fitness for a second. Yeah. And I mean part of why I'm talking so much about the fitness part of it too is it relates so much to what we do practicing law. It. The fitness. Being healthy is really, really important. But so 75 hard. We've both done 75 hard. I love 75 hard. I think it's great. But it's more on that sexy side. It's not the boring stuff. And I do think that that's a problem for some People because they. They think, I'll do 75 hard and I'm good forever.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And it's not. And that's not the message at all that Andy Frisello passes on. It's like, this is a lifetime thing.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And so I Wonder, talk about 75 hard versus what? The other stuff we were talking about, the boring stuff.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So I want to talk about 75 hard. And then I'll talk about the 12 hour walk as well. Because I think those two things kind of in tandem can work together. I have my thoughts on 75 hard. So I've done it. I've done 75 hard three times. I've completed it once. And so I was listening to Frizzella the other day on a pod and he talks, he was asked about like the success, like how people can succeed at it. And not. He goes, it's when people say, I'm going to try it. So the try of 75 hard, he's like, that's when you fail at it. He's like, it's not something you try. It's just a thing you do do for this period. But then whenever I finally completed it, I had a friend who did it and he kind of gave me some tips on success pieces for this program. He goes, you have to be intentional, but you also have to plan for the full time. So I had a plan then where I literally put a post it up on my bathroom to take the picture, the self picture. And then he's like, you also have to have a conversation too, with your close friends and family about this. Can you swear on this?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

About this wackadoodle shit that you're about to do here, because it is going to be a life changer for these next 75 days. So a lot of it is getting to that end of completion. Right. So then I did it. Now, what was crazy for me, though, I don't know if it's actually a life. I don't know if I agree with Andy where it becomes this. I think it's a thing you can tap back into because you've done it. But when people are like, yeah, I'm just going to keep doing it now forever and keep drinking a gallon of water every day, carry on my jug, do all this stuff, I personally don't find that that's a thing. I actually ended up stepping back from the gym for a while after that and ended up kind of going, not reverse, but not. It didn't. It wasn't. So it was like really high up here. And then kind of here, not way back down, but you know what I mean? And then kind of. And then got back into the gym again. I needed to find something that could kind of kick me back into to it afterwards because it was such an extreme thing.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So that's interesting. I've heard other people say that.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Where I think wealth from the lifelong thing too is because Amy and I, we did, we did certify for phases one, two and three. Right. And to us, I feel it was more of like a reset. And then the rest of it, it's a reset to, okay, get us back to where we wanted to be and then you focus on health the rest of the time.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So it's not like. And I think that some people do view it as we do it one time, we're good and it just doesn't work that way.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. And I like the idea of. Because I have another friend, he just did it for the third time, but he does it like once every couple years, even for myself. Like, we've talked about our affinity for a good bourbon or what have you. I'll do a 30 day, like throughout the year, I'll do multiple like 30 day pauses. And so I think it's that idea too of being able to show like have a reset or be able to hit the pause button on something for a bit and then kind of kick it, you know, and start again.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Let's talk about drinking a little bit.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Like what is your view on drinking? Because you talked about taking the 30 day reset and all that. So let's talk about that a little bit.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So I have two parents that are alcoholics. My belief is my dad died from it, you know, in some form or another. It had a huge effect on them. But they were beer drinkers. My dad, whenever I was a kid, was told by my mom he drank liquor whenever I was younger, like whenever I was really little, got really violent and then basically was told, hey, if you don't stop drinking that then I'm leaving. And then. And then. So, yeah, for me it was. We didn't. I don't know, I stopped drinking from like 19 to like, I think it was like 30, like mid to late 30s.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

The years when people usually drink.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes, yes. Yeah, yeah. So members of the Mormon Church didn't drink at all. Then when we left, took me a little while to get back in. But because of, I don't drink. I don't think since then too, I've had any. I don't drink beer at all. Went more the liquor route. And so for me, the idea of having the ability to pause is both a health piece, but it's also a gauge of kind of knowing what runs within the family as well. So to know that I've got some controllables on it. And so that's kind of the way I look at it now. But if we talk about it, I think it's enjoyable. My daughter and I, we talk about it quite a bit. In that sense, the taste of it's great. I'd rather at times have a glass of bourbon instead of having like dessert or what have you. I think it's more enjoyable.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I think the way you just framed that is perfectly where a major problem with especially lawyers drinking is like the central part of what you're doing. So let's go have drinks is right. Instead, you're not going to say, hey, let's go have a dessert.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right, Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

But if you view it as like, let's go have dinner.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And maybe I'll have a drink as a dessert, I think it's a perfect frame.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right. Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Where'd you come. Is that something you came up with yourself?

[Christopher Nicholas]

No, no. I mean. I mean, we have massive sweet tooth. Right. So, I mean, desserts are tasty, but it's. It's one of those things where at the end of the day, I mean, when Megan and I talk about it, we'd rather have. We'd rather go the other route. We'd rather have a drink instead of having a treat. That is the treat.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I want to shift gears a little bit.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Sure, sure.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I mean, can we talk about the partnership?

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, yeah. To. Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And I'm sure that there's some limitations, but I guess. How are you doing now? Let's talk about that. How are you doing? Because we're going to go back. I want to talk about. I'm not going to dig too deep, but I do want to ask you about it. So how are you doing now?

[Christopher Nicholas]

Really well, actually better. A lot better than a few months ago. Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

How long did it take you to get to that point where you're like, okay, I'm good now.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So partnership ended end of last year or. Right. Literally last day of last year. So probably it's taken about five to six months.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And yeah, I've had experience with this.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And mine was. I feel like mine may have been a lot easier. My breakup was eight days.

[Christopher Nicholas]

And mine was two weeks, technically.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Okay.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Technically two weeks. Yes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That's good. That's good. How. Let's go back to when you realized it was. This was going to happen. Right. So how, how did it feel back then? You. You realize this is gonna, this is gonna break up. We spent several years building this thing.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Seven. Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And it's gonna break out. I mean, how was that? Like, what was your mindset like?

[Christopher Nicholas]

So what was interesting is we had had back and forth conversations actually about it earlier or mid last year. And so just talks about what happens. You know what I mean? Is it something, you know, is it time for a step away and just starting a conversation. Right. Just. And having that dialogue. And it just kind of kept, you know, here and there at lunches or what have you, it just pop up and just talks. And then finally, I think mid December, beginning of December is when it kind of really started coming into form. And then finally at the end or kind of mid December, whenever we got back from Gretchen and I got back from a trip, we had a conversation and me and the partner had a conversation and that was kind of it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So. So I want to say it was.

[Christopher Nicholas]

A quick speed up of it, but. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And we're gonna, we'll get into more of it.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I'm gonna take my experience.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And I want, I want to hear what yours was like. So the, during the partnership, the whole time I was, I was stressed because I was thinking, okay, I got to make sure that I'm doing everything I need to be doing because I don't want them. Him to be worrying about that I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So like, there's just constant stress. And then we, we have the conversation that we're going to break up. I go for a long walk, think about it. Great. I drive home, talk to Amy, we have dinner. Was the best I'd felt the entire time of the partnership. I wonder what your, what your experience was like.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So it's interesting and like, as I've reflected back is I think, and this would be for anybody in any position, I think one of my downfalls and you know, if I had, if I talked to him today, it's one of the things I'd say is I think I actually faltered in a way too, of like wanting to mold my partner into a vision of what I believed a partner should be, which is it's a naivete on my part, looking back now, having a piece of reflection and obviously then. Which means then though too, for all of the, for, you know, a fair chunk of those years to. A lot of my internal thoughts and conversations were about whys like, why this, why that, what have you? And the reality is he was doing the best he could with what he knew. You know what I mean? In that sense, I never felt, because I had shifted more towards the business role. And I know a lot of people run that idea of like, if I'm not doing the cases I feel less than or that they could look at me as not doing my share. I actually view the business side as being such an massively integral part over the day to day lawyering.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

With that. We'll stay on that for just a second. I agree. There's a perfect model of looking at this.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Morgan Morgan.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

The most important part of that business is the business side. Not to say that the litigation you get, they've got Keith Mitnick one, which is bananas. Who maybe if not he's not. If he's not the best, he's one of the top five. Right. Best trial lawyers in the country. Right. So there is no. Probably, there is no Mitnick without Morgan Morgan maybe. But Morgan Morgan is going to be around no matter what.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And I don't mean to diminish Mitnick at all.

[Christopher Nicholas]

No, no, But I know what you're saying.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

He's an amazing lawyer.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

His brand is far bigger because of working for Morgan.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

But he's still an amazing trial.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I agree with you. I think that trial lawyers in general don't view it that way. And we're trial lawyers.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So. But generally in our profession, it's not viewed that way. Right. And why do you think that is? Because I think I agree with you 100%.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Well, it's kind of like what we were talking about off camera earlier is the idea that the badge of honor that we all wear after getting our number and our license is I am a lawyer. Right. So from the Clark Kent piece when you wake up in the morning to changing and, you know, putting your S on, it's lawyer. It's not business owner. It's not CEO, it's not entrepreneur. It is lawyer. So I am titled. Now, as a lawyer, the reason that I can own a law firm in most states is because I'm a lawyer. And I think that that's the reason why there's that, like, thing. So if I take this piece off and I just do X, I'm just like the guy down the street that owns a convenience store. Right. He's just a business owner. Just a. But I think it's so diff. It's different in that sense too. It just depends on how you want to look at it?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah. Because you were talking about your. A friend of yours, how it is almost like. Yeah, you're putting on this costume, really. But it's more of a costume than anything else.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

But it is even worse with trial or something. I think. I think we do, like, you know, it's. It's. Take that times 10. All right, so we were talking about your partnership. So go back to what you're talking about with that, because we were. You. You were talking about, you know, molding. You were trying to mold your partner. Everything but. And I interrupted you with that. That little side.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Conversation. So.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. So for me, it was just this thought piece of, like, I think in my head of, like, my own issues, like, of expectation. You know what I mean? And so I put that all on. On me. So then, like, we had our roles divvied out and everything else. So then he. At the point when it was finally decided, it was pretty quick. It was about two weeks and then in and out pretty fast. I think most of the, like, for me, like, I don't know, right away, it. We didn't, like. When I say we, like, Gretchen and I didn't have a true, like, moment of, like, relief, like you were talking about or what have you, in a sense, and not for quite a while, because it was more like we were in crisis. Right. Like for, you know, and it's in just. We had to wake up. We had to focus on the business. What are we going to do to get this thing to churn again, to get it to move? And so, I mean, we had the cases coming in. We had the case load. It's an issue at the back end on the churn rate. And so that. That's kind of really where our focus became. We didn't have a lot of time to sit and think about that. We had some other bigger decisions we had to make pretty quickly about payroll and team and things like that. So I think it's one of those things for us is we don't have that. And then the other. The thing, too, maybe that might have been a little different too, is we were friends for a pretty long time. And that's. And I've also. So I've been married to aggression for almost 30 years. I've known. I knew Jake for almost 20. And it's like a divorce. I mean, it really, like, the thing people need to understand is partnerships. And I've thought about it a lot lately is like, it is literally a second marriage. Like, if you're going to get into one, you have got to treat it like another marriage. It really is. And so if your current marriage is not that good and strong, I pause you against getting into a part. You know what I mean? Like, you can't, like, balance two marriages if one is already rocky.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

And so I think it's one of those things, like, you cannot do it. It just can't happen.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That is interesting and I think you're right. So something I've thought about quite a bit is, is with the. The breakup with me and Chris, we never had those, like, really intimate conversations that we should have had. We did a lot of the who does this? And what are we going to call it? And all that kind of stuff. I. It's funny because, like, it's so funny because Jim and I talk a lot about this. We're like, like, worry about the name last. But there was a big, like, we did talk a lot about the name. Is it, you know, his last name first? My last name. That was like, it was such a big deal, I think. And it was like, instead of like, that's not important. We should have been talking about, okay, what like, let's talk about the money more like, what's your financial situation? What's your financial situation? What happens when. If this happens, what. And we didn't have any of those conversations.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. And I think it's one of those things too, of really trying to get the vision to align. So those conversations help get, like, the joint vision to ultimately come in align. And I think that's. I agree with you. I think it's one of the areas where I, like, or we, you know, together, probably cumulatively failed to not fully get it aligned in that sense of like, really, like, what do we. What do you know what I mean? It's that question of, like, what do you want? And where you hit it over and over and over again is like, really, what do we really, really want out of this? What do we really want it to look like? What. You know what I mean? And all of those things.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

At what point so that you had. Yours was seven years, mine was 18 months. Right. So completely different, but seven years. At what point, though, did you realize that your paths were not aligned?

[Christopher Nicholas]

I think it was probably after potentially, I would say maybe after my partner stopped taking cases. I think because he struggled with an identity shift of being an attorney to now going being a managing partner who doesn't have cases and it's just overseen. I think it was a thing where he didn't you know, and these were conversations that we would have all the time of like, I don't know what to do. Is this right? You know, and he both enjoyed it, I think, and didn't. I don't. At this point, I don't know. But I would say that that may have been one of the bigger struggles.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I wonder. And you don't go into specifics. I don't need to know. But I do wonder, did you all. When you kind of realized, and he was probably realizing at the same time, I mean, did you all ever have those, like, deep conversations about what you're like, what needs to change to kind of get you back on track?

[Christopher Nicholas]

Probably not then. And it's an interesting thing, as I was listening to this thing at the gym the other day where this. I think it was, you know, it might have been at both. But I'll just. From speaking for myself, my inability to actually just speak up at the time. Right. Because there's always a fee, you know, I think most people think that lawyers just want to have conflict all the damn time. I hate conflict. I think it's unnecessary and it's just stupid. And so my kids say I have this, like, innate ability to just, like, walk away from shit and just get.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Away, you know, Amazing ability, by the way.

[Christopher Nicholas]

But it's this idea of this thing I was listening to where he talks about truth. He's like, so here's the thing. We all think in our head, we have this. So, like you and I, I know I've got to have a hard conversation with you. So in my head, what do I do? I predict the outcome of how you're going to react. And then I pattern now what I'm going to say to you based on what I believe that outcome is going in my head, what it's going to be. He's like, you're wrong. So instead, do this. Say what you need to say. So say the truth first, of what you believe or what you want to talk about. Then just let that outcome be what it is. And so if you can do that, which is, again, that takes a lot of brave, you know your own self brave, but it takes you getting out of your own head and kind of moving forward that way.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I don't know how it's possible to ignore what I think the outcome is.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Going to be, but it's a world of what ifs, right? Because no matter what predictive analysis you run, odds are you're wrong. Think about it, like, anytime that you've gone to, like, terminate somebody you already have in your head how it's going to go down. Has it? Most times, it generally doesn't go as bad as what you're thinking now. Every now and then, there's the outliers, but most of the time you're like, it wasn't that bad.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I've had twice where it was significantly worse than I thought it was going.

[Christopher Nicholas]

To be, but it still didn't fit within that mold of where you were at. Right. And so. But it's just those kind of things where. And I've had that too. But it's like, overall, it's like we can't. No matter what, you can't predict it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So why not just say it and live with it and go with the other end?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I don't know if you had this, but I've had these, I think, with cases and other things. But like, with cases specifically, I kind of hold off. I've got this thing, this issue with the case, and I'm stressing about it for months or weeks maybe, and then I talk to whoever I need to talk to about it, whether it's the client or the opposing attorney, whatever. And then I can't tell you how many times, like, oh, there was nothing. There was nothing to worry about at all. It's amazing how many times we have things like that in our lives that we just do the thing. Whatever you need to do.

[Christopher Nicholas]

You gotta, like, rip the band aid off and just do it. There is one thing within the whole partnership piece, and I think it can go this way with your partner, with anybody within your firm that may be up at a higher level or what have you. And it's a thing I ended up reading the other day where it was this idea of blame, and there's the three levels of blame. And I think it's important because I've thought about it a lot since I read it. And it's this idea of you can. So phase one is, the lowest level, is you blame the other person. Everything's their fault. Everything that went wrong, all of the issues, their fault. Phase two, blame yourself as the leader. And it's the thing I took on immediate. Everything bad that has happened to the firm, to the business, all of it, it's all my fault. I'm the leader. Because anything good that happens within the business, the team did it. All right? Everything good happened because of the team. Everything bad happened because of me. But then phase three is actually, to me is this great area. You blame no one. It's no one's fault. It's just. It just is. And it's brilliant because it's just a thing that happened and people move on and it's okay. And so it's like this other, like, odd level of enlightenment where you're just like, it's just a thing that happened. So now the business is still going, and it's okay.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

How long did it take you to get to that point there? Because that's.

[Christopher Nicholas]

I read it in about two minutes. No, and I'm still. I think I'm getting there. It takes work, but it takes a lot of time to go and just say, it's okay. Like it. And I think the sooner that you can do that and let go of blame, of the other blame, of yourself, then I think you move to a better spot.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I think it's a really, really important lesson. I mean, I'll be honest with you. I think my initial response, and this may be just, like, human nature, like, my. Like, it's just like, who. Who's at fault? Like, absolutely. But I will. I am good at backing it off and saying, okay, like, how am I at fault for this? Which is probably not right either.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That is a different level. That's just a different way of thinking completely. That is. That is tough. But I do like that. Like, just. But let me. Let me ask you this. I do sometimes maybe think that some people would take that to never hold someone accountable, which is something different.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, I mean, I think within this. All right. It's like, we've had to. I think you have to go through those kind of that cycle, too, because there's lessons within each of those going, okay, well, what could I have done differently? Like, what things can I learn? How would I react going forward? What kind of. You know what I mean? What. How would I push? What things would I have done differently? And there's a growth pattern. I mean, it's that idea of, like, you ever have those friends that get divorced, and then right after they get divorced, like, now they've become, like, you know, prior to that, they were just, like, gamers who sat around, ate potato chips. But then right after the divorce, now they're, like, entering fitness competitions and shit.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So it's this whole, like, rebranded version of themselves now on who they are post divorce. And so it's almost like that, too, as you. There's these, like, things that you now kind of learn about yourself as you're going through those questions that you have to rebrand a little bit, and things that you learn about yourself.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah, I've always wondered though, with those people, are they Mark. Some of them may be like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna show you I'm better than you.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

But part of it, I wonder if like, are those things that you should have been doing during the marriage to. Or it could one or two things. Maybe you could have been doing that during the marriage and you wouldn't have a divorce.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Or are those things that you didn't do because of the marriage?

[Christopher Nicholas]

That's interesting.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah. But because marriage is an important part as you talked about. Like, it's like if you, if you have a bad marriage, you shouldn't get into a partnership.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That, that's an important piece of this. So like there are certain things you should do during the marriage to keep the marriage together. Same thing with the partnership. Like you, there's certain things during the partnership you should do to keep the partnership together. So is there anything like that with your partnership that you, you look back and you like, I should have been doing these things for the benefit of the partnership?

[Christopher Nicholas]

I think it's those, Honestly, to me, the first thing is those open conversations. Really open and deeper. I mean, obviously we knew each other really well, but not well enough. And then it's, I think it's having, I think if you, when you do these things from the jump, what did Gretchen's contract professor said there's no such thing as a contract that's too short or, you know, or that's not long enough. So our contracts were way too short. We never had enough stuff spelled out so that like the rainy day clauses or the alien abduction clauses or whatever else it may be. Right? You think of all that wackadoodle shit and you're just like, why didn't we have that in there? Why didn't we have this right? Because. So it's just like, hey, we're two buddies, let's go ahead and do this thing and life's just going to be awesome. Well, I think you still have to plan for that stuff because you have to have some really honest conversations from that at the get at the jump going if this doesn't work. Where's that clause on if this doesn't work? What does this look like? Yeah, I think you, you, you're think you're not thinking of it in a spot at the get go because it's everything. Sunny days and everything's fun and nice.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So there you, you talked about how you knew him for 20 years. There's knowing somebody and there's knowing somebody yeah. And were there signs early on that you Maybe. Yeah, you knew him, but yeah, maybe this isn't a good idea for a partnership.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So I call this the. It's the Daughtry effect. Okay, so you know Daughtry, the singer from American Idol?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I was gonna ask you what the hell you're talking about.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, okay, so Chris Daughtry.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I know who that is. I couldn't tell you anything else about him.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So we watched one season. I think that was the only season of Idol that we ever watched way back in the day. So Daughtry's a country singer. I think rock and roller or I don't know, whoever. Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And Becca's giving you the. No, not a country.

[Christopher Nicholas]

But he's a. He's a rock and roll guy. He's a. He's a rock and roll guy. And so the thing we loved, like when we first saw Daughtry comes out, gives us a little like two set, two minute spiel on his family and stuff like that. You know, guy working it up the route and good, good, good dude. And goes out, sings a great song. They love him, he gets through. Then what we end up though is this idea of the Daughtry effect, which it's starts and it's just like, we know so there. We're like, we know him, but we don't really know him. And then it's like now the vignettes get a little longer. Now it's like five minutes of like his sob story. I don't. You know, or whatever it may be. Right. Made for tv, but it's just like, how much do I really want to know Daughtry versus just listen to his music and just kind of. Kind of know him a little bit, you know what I mean? In that sense. And so it's. I think it's like that idea of like, how much do you actually really, really know somebody? I mean, what I've realized even from all of this is like, there's probably only three people in my life that I really like, really know, and it's my wife and my two girls. That's it. Yeah, even my brothers. Fuck, man. I don't know. Maybe. You know, I mean, we talk a lot, we see each other here and there, but we really know each other that deeply. I don't know. And so, yeah, the.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So that is interesting. I was watching, I think it was Joe Rogan had somebody on in the last few months, and they were talking about that. If you can expand that, that. Because there's like different layers to right. Where you've got like this, this internal circle that know. That knows, you know. And then there's a circle outside of that, like your immediate family, I guess, extended family, all that. That's kind of like in that circle, they.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yep.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

They know you, but they don't know you.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And then like outside that is people. Yeah, I know, I know, Chris.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

You know, there's probably another circle right outside that. But there are these levels of knowing people that are important. And if you can expand that inner circle. Yeah, it does. It does lead to more happiness.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Interesting. That's interesting because I've had this thought lately too, where it's this idea of like friends. Right. Because we've all got. It's like the thing from fight club. I feel like in life these days, right. Where we all have single serving friends. And so it's the idea of like, so as. But then I see and I look around and I've got like these, you know, like, you know, as I see through the community or what have you, people that they happen to go play pickleball with or they do this other stuff with or what have you. And so I'm like, is it a thing? So I've told myself lately, I'm like, I want to be more intentional about finding friends. Then it feels like middle school again, where I'm just trying to be that awkward kid who tries to go bought into it. And then. But during the 12 hour walk, one of the interesting things I thought about was maybe I actually don't need it. Maybe I'm actually good because maybe that. And not that that circle should stay tight forever that way, but with what I've got, it's pretty good. So why not just enjoy the friendships and actually foster maybe that other level here more than what in to make it to expand out. You know what I mean?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Instead of trying to just be like you, like Oprah giving away cars instead of you get a friend, you get a friend, you get a friend type of a thing. So I don't know.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I would say this. I would agree with that approach more than the single serving friend type. I've never thought about that. But it is amazing how like you, you do sometimes have these like, deep friendships. At least I do. I'm assuming other people do. But you don't. Your, your, your experience with that person is very limited.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And I'll just use. I don't. I'm just gonna make this one up. But like, so for jiu jitsu, for me, I'm not I'm not able to do it. Next I got a shoulder injury, but that, like, I could see where, like, I've got, like, really deep friendships only in the jiu jitsu community, but they don't. They don't know the name of my kids I was gonna wife. Things like that. Which I think those are kind of like prerequisites of actually knowing something.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Right.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

But I think that with what you're talking about, I think that that's right. If you were to. So instead of having all these spread out, which I think are important. Okay. Focusing on that circle and focusing on you, I think that probably would. I think you're onto something. I think that that probably would lead to more happiness.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Well, and I also. Don't you think too, though, it's the idea that if you're actually okay here internally, then maybe you don't need this.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

You're actually okay with this. If you're okay with you. And so I'm pretty okay with who I am.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Will you. The. The. All the. That those circles are all negatively affected if you're not okay with.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right, right. Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Completely agree.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. So.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

All right. So I want to shift gears a little bit on April 19th of 2013.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Okay.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

You said I am a victim of my own decisions. Hashtag choices. Go back to that time if you can remember. What. What were you. What were you thinking? What was that about?

[Christopher Nicholas]

I feel like I should be eating hot wings right now, but I have no clue. So I have a really. I have a good memory in some areas, bad in the others. I would. So that time in my life, I'm getting ready to graduate law school. So I'm a 3L almost done. So.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yes. Is 2013 in 2013.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So yeah, I finished. Then it's either. And what was the quote again? I'm a victim of.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I am a victim of my own decisions.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Well, it could have been that too. It could have just been what the fuck am I doing in law school here again? And yeah, it's just one of those pieces. There would be my thought it's either a movie quote or it's something where I was actually really like, what am I doing?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So April. It was April.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So when you almost ready to. Almost ready to graduate.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you're approaching graduation.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Getting ready for bar job prospects at the time. Anything.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yes. I had worked at a small law firm up in Woodland park, which is a small mountain town for a family law attorney, and so knew that I was going to more than likely end up going to do family law with him right after.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

What was it, what was it like working for a smaller firm?

[Christopher Nicholas]

It's all I've ever done. And then everything was, I mean you're tight in with the boss and highs and lows of any sort of like, I mean when all lawyers go through like how to, you know, like employee etiquette training and how to manage a law firm. Everyone went through that, I believe, which is total bs. It's, you know what I mean? There's this total thing where it's like they. It was good. I mean for me at least it did exactly what I was looking for at the time. And I still today I like he's a judge now. I actually respect him quite a bit. Thought he was really good.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

It is interesting about like small town attorneys. Many of them just want to be judges.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. I have no, I don't know about you. Any desire ever?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

None.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Me neither. None.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Amy's aunt and uncle, they bought me a gavel. I think it was right after law school or in law school. And they're like, you can have it when you become a judge. I was like, well, I've never become a judge.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, I think it's isolating. The pay to me is limited time that it takes away. I mean we've talked in the past about time and I just didn't. I don't want anything that to me, I don't want anything taking that away.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I've talked in the past about. We're talking about time. You're trading hours for years. And it's an interesting concept where you're so stuck in the day to day that you end up losing years and so you end up accomplishing nothing. So I wonder what your thoughts are on that.

[Christopher Nicholas]

On hours for years? Yeah, like I don't. I guess I look at the way I looked at time lately has been this idea of I'm at a spot in my life and even with every. With all the change and flux in the firm and everything else, I'm probably there more now than I was in the past. But in reality, if I needed to, I could probably work 15 to 20 hours a week and make a really good, A really good wage.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Sure.

[Christopher Nicholas]

But it's the time back that I have where I can do basically what, whatever I want. If that's to start a coaching business or if it's to go out to dinner with my wife or go grab lunch with her or to go do a marketing thing or to go see my kid up in Denver, you know what I Mean, what have you. And I think it's when you talk about hours for years, while the reality there is, is I can't get back that time to go have lunch with my kid in Denver.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Sure.

[Christopher Nicholas]

You know what I mean? Or go meet another attorney. I have an attorney friend up in Denver. Or we'll go grab lunch here and there, what have you. And so it's those kind of things where to have that flexibility. And so it's even my kids, they were talking to me the one day and just saying if everything with Springs Walker went awry tomorrow, and I had. And it just closed. They're like, they looked at me and they're like, you'd be the worst employee ever. And it's. They're like, it's not because you'd be an asshole. It's just because you know, like, you want to be good at it because you know too much. You've. It's Oz, right. You've pulled the curtain. You now know what Oz looks like. So you'd be terrible at it. And so it's that kind of an idea, too.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah. So you were talking about, like, you know, going to see your daughter in Denver, whatever. But it is interesting because those are the choices we have every day.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you could, you could, you know, spend a couple hours and go see your daughter. You could spend a couple hours checking email or you could do, you know, spend a couple hours, you bill building something that's going to make your firm better. And most people spend the two hours checking email. And that's that concept of trading hours for years where next thing, you know, 10 years go by and you don't know where they went.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right. And I think it's the. Well, I mean, for everybody, and you guys have talked about this too on the show, is get a person who can check your email or program. I mean, really. I mean, I mentioned Martel a lot, but his first thing is you hire an executive assistant right off the jump. You get them to check your email and then get people to. So the 1080, 10 rule, get people. You come up with the idea of this system that you want or this new thing to make your firm better, get somebody to do the 80%. So then you can go have that thing and then you come back in at the end and check it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah. The volume of email that an attorney gets these days is quite overwhelming. I mean, I'm assuming my email is like your email. Yeah, I mean, it is. It's. It's. It's worse than phone calls.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you, you have a receptionist. And I've heard people talk about this, they treat email like a receptionist and I think that's an interesting concept. Emails a little more, more personal. Because it's, it's not like a receptionist. Because it's not like the receptionist is listening in on your phone calls.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

It is different in that. And like, you know, get bank transactions, things like that that, you know, come through.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

It's so. It is different. But it is such an overwhelming thing though. It just, I don't know how it's sustainable. I really don't.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Like, I think it's one thing like things like that that are such a stressor on the profession that we gotta find a solution.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

One of them is an executive assistant.

[Christopher Nicholas]

I think so. I mean, so mine, she's our office admin, but also takes care of my email. We meet once a week. We've set up certain forms folders and she set up certain automations for other things that can kind of go through. I think you just, you have to be intentional about it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

And then she'll literally, when we sit down, we'll walk through all of them and it's quick. I mean, it's. And then we go through other stuff too throughout that, you know, that needs to happen. But she takes care of all my travel. She booked all of this. I didn't touch any of it. She, you know what I mean? Everything else, like, she handles all that. And so like one of our credit cards just got hacked. She takes care of all implementing all the new cards, every, all that other stuff. So she's vital.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Do you give her guidelines on travel?

[Christopher Nicholas]

I do, yeah. Very specific.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

What are they? I want to hear them.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So because Denver is a United hub, it's a. So we fly United out of Denver unless it's so in the Springs, we have a small airport. If I'm going to Phoenix or to Vegas, I'll fly out through the Springs, through Southwest. Outside of that it's United through Denver. I do not do connections. So it's one way. If I can I seat to a row two only.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I fly first row two only.

[Christopher Nicholas]

If I can't, I don't want one. I think one row one's the worst. Row one's the worst because you gotta put your shit up.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

One is worse than sitting in coach.

[Christopher Nicholas]

I think it is. And so I'm just like at this point I, I fly first, so two or three, but I prefer two if I'm with Gretchen, Gretchen gets the window seat. I Get the aisle. If I'm not with Gretchen, I'll take the window. And then that's generally it there. I rent through national, and she's got my membership on that. Those are. That's pretty kind of the gist on it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I like it.

[Christopher Nicholas]

She knows all of it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That's good. All right, so let's shift gears a little bit. You were a teacher.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, I was.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

And if you were to go back and be. If you could become a teacher again, I wonder how you would change the projection of the way things have gone. If you would at all.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So. Man. So my teaching experience did not end the way I thought it would. And so I would not change it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Though, because it ended abruptly, right?

[Christopher Nicholas]

It did end. Yeah, it ended abruptly. Both Gretchen and I, we were non renewed in the same year. We had just bought a house. And so we're like, what do we do? And then the thought was, is like, let's go to law school. Which made no sense. But the interesting thing now is, like, looking at it, and I think it's the conversation that I had with Chuck Boyd years ago where he's like, sometimes the thing he said to me is like, sometimes the thing. The thing that you think is the worst thing that happened to you ends up being the best thing. And I mean, in retrospect, in the moment, it was, this is terrible. But today it's. I needed that. I'm so glad. I'm actually not a teacher anymore because of the lifestyle that I have. I am in business to create a lifestyle that I want. That is it. Like, you know, I'm happy that we can help people. I'm happy that we provide a service, and I'm really happy for the team that we have that we can do that for them, too. But overall, it's to provide a lifestyle. And there's certain things, like row two that I want. You know what I mean? Or what have you. And I'm okay saying that. And it just. But as a teacher, there's no way I'm probably able to sit in row two.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Would you be a lawyer today if you were renewed on your contract as a. As a teacher?

[Christopher Nicholas]

Oh, that's interesting. Probably not.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah, it's an interesting thing.

[Christopher Nicholas]

I don't know if I could have seen it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah. At the time, because I think Chuck's right there. Think about that. Like, how that thing that you thought was the worst thing that could have happened to you, or close to the. One of the worst. It ended up being the best thing.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Dude. Tyson. So the crazy the crazy thing is like, I was in, like, I was like watching Ron Clark. I was like reading Ray Fesquith, who's this teacher down in San Diego, like all these guys where it's like, you can make a difference. And like, I was jazzed. So like the same way, like I listened to all this business shit, now I was doing it with teacher stuff back then. And I'm just like, this is the thing, right? We can have an impact on kids. We're going to be, you know, create all these lifelong learners and everything's going to be amazing. But yet now they're just all just on YouTube and playing roadblocks.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I don't know what's really interesting is one, I think you'd be an amazing teacher. But I saw you light up more talking about that than I've seen you light up about anything else we talked about. That's interesting.

[Christopher Nicholas]

I mean, I think it's the idea of how in on something, right? Because if we talk about growing the business, it's the same type of thing. I can get like jacked about, like, here's this new, you know, idea or here's how we can do X or Y. It's the same thing. But here I've got control over it. There somebody else had control over it. So the reason I'm happy to be an attorney, because part of the reason though too, that I. That law school became the thing is it's the one. So they can take away my ability to teach because it's reliant upon somebody else. They can't ever take away my bar. I mean, they could, but, you know, I got to do something some stupid. But like, they can't take away and my ability to own the firm. And so that's all on me. There's a lot of controllables on that, that, that I've got there so that I really like.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

That's a good point. Especially being an employee in general. That's absolutely right.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you're talking about you'd be a terrible employee. I. Yeah, you. I mean, I think most law firm.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Owners, I like to think I'd be a good, good employee, but I would be compliant. You know, in that sense, I. I.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Think I could be a good employee, but I. I'd probably miserable.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Terrible.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I like, they don't want me showing up whenever I want to show up, right? No, I mean, like, here's the thing. Like, if I, if I worked like an employee, like I worked like a business owner, like, they would love me, right? So.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right. So maybe may not because your buy and wouldn't be theirs.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Right, Exactly. All right, So I want to ask you about something else that you posted on July 5th of this year.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Oh.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So just, just recently.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Sure.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Your grades do not define you. Exclamation point. So your, your grades do not define you. I was a C student in law school. I failed the bar exam today. I run a seven figure law firm and have a team that is helping build each day. I agree with those things. What, what compelled you to make that post?

[Christopher Nicholas]

So I was. I think you got that off X. Yeah, I very rarely post on X and trying to get. I watch this course, I'm posting on X. But what compelled me to post that is this idea too though, that I think so. We're big fans of Survivor at my house and Survivor is a closed world. Right. And I play a lot of Fortnite. Fortnite's a closed world. I think school generally, you know, if it's high school, undergrad, law school, medical school, what have you, it's closed world. And we've talked about this idea. What do people do that don't know what they want to do with their lives? They go back to school to get more schooling. Why? Because it's a safe, closed world. But watching, and I think at the time too, I'm watching Gretchen kind of go through this like the hierarchy, right? She has friends who will text her and be like, hey, grades are in. What are we doing? And then Gretchen's like, I don't care. You know, I've already got X. But there's a little part of her that does care because she wants to achieve and do well for herself. But it's that passing kind of thing of the one upsmanship within the law student world. And so I remember in law school too, I don't know if they did this at yours too. Is that idea of look to the left, look to the right, only one of you will be here at the end. Which is bullshit because it's a place that wants to make money. So they're going to keep everybody in. So I was after Toledo, after my first year, I was actually in my first semester at Denver. I was put on academic probation because I had gotten some Cs. And so I had to do this like extra bullshit course and then did that and went through it and what have you. The reality is I'm like, I couldn't at the time. I was like, I need to go be a da. I need to go be a public defender or what have you. I couldn't get into either of them and then ended up doing the family law thing. But none of it shifted truly until I took ownership of it all and just went out on my own. And so I went out on my own with just three family law clients and had my own firm. And whenever I first started and it was just me and build it up to about 20 to 25 and then formed up but I'm like it's not the grade. Like it isn't the grades. Like when is the last time that you've interviewed somebody or you've asked them what their law school grades were?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Never.

[Christopher Nicholas]

And you don't ever. Right? I could care less period about any of it. But in that moment the reason I posted it is like it's such a, you know, mind fuck that it just like it really screws with you on like if I don't do X, I'm not going to get into big law. Who truly wants to work big law? You think you do. So it's this idea lately that I've had about the reality versus the or the idea versus the reality. Right. The idea I want a big law. I need the grades, I need this status, all these things. The idea of it sounds great. The reality me idea I want to learn to play the mandolin. I love it. Reality I can't read music, I've never played an instrument and whenever I sat through my first few lessons I'm like fuck, I'm terrible at it and it's going to take me forever. So I want to, I'm a person, I want results pretty quickly. And so it's like eh. So now I've got a mandolin sitting in my office that just sits there.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

It's a nice second piece.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

How would you change law school?

[Christopher Nicholas]

I'd make there. I've seen things lately where it's like a two year program with a practicum or like a residency. I think it needs a residency component of some form period that where you get credit for like a long term like the last year. If you're going to keep it three, make two years actual classes. I'm watching what Gretchen's doing. I know, I'm sure I had many. I know that I had many of them. I'm sure you did too. Classes that are just bs, they have no practical ability at all like it's rock and roll law or what? Like what? Because I think you're paying way too much money for something that is way too important to not have any practicality for potential practice or potential bar exam. Because the struggle with it, too, is if you just get your jd, none of it matters. I mean, I don't know what kind of jobs. And I'm sure people are getting jobs out there with just a jd, but it's the bar. It is the bar, period. That is it. And what was fascinating to me too, is one ally struggled on, you know, certain classes or what have you. Like, I remember taking. I took civ pro from a professor first, and I, I didn't learn hardly anything. He just a lot of pontification, a lot of, you know, verbose Eerie Doctrine. Yeah. Didn't learn anything. But then you take the Barbary study, and I'm like, why wasn't this taught here? Way back here, this way. And so why not just teach the Barbary courses to as the class 100 every time in the beginning?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Because if this is the thing we're studying for at the end. So it's kind of like I was just at a trial training, and they were talking about when they start up a case for litigation, the first thing they do is they get like, they, like, as they're drafting the complaint and doing the case review, they draft their jury instructions. Right. Then they're like. And here's why. Because if we don't know the end, which now with law school we do. Right. The bar, why wouldn't we start getting to that right at the beginning? So now if we know our jury instructions and what we're looking for, everything we're doing is geared toward that thing at the end. And so why not do that?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I, I agree with that to a certain extent. I do. I do worry there's a risk with that, that maybe you would, you would have tunnel vision. And because there's other claims out there. Several times you've seen this, where you have a case where you think it's one thing. Sure. And you, you add a ton of value.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

These other things. So as long as you have contingencies to account for that, I would agree with that model. And we don't do it that way. But I understand. I. And that's something that I have told our younger attorneys. Like, you need to be thinking about the mai. So we don't, we don't draft them. But yeah, you need to be thinking that our mais are drain structure.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Okay.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So you need to be thinking about what those look like at the beginning of the case, because it does help you formulate it.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I do think, you know, just flat out drafting them. Because what happens is, I don't. I don't know if you've seen this sometimes if you. It could be something as simple as that. So let's go with that idea. Your staff follows the guidance of the attorney and the lead of the attorney. If they might just look at the.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Mais and think and not see anything else outside these other outlier pieces.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah, so I think that's a concern. Like, so you're talking about, you know, I'm interviewing witnesses, I'm interviewing the client. I'm not thinking about anything else because. Because I've got those jury insurance.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right, right, right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So I think that that's a concern. But I mean, I'm. I'm. He's a very smart person, so I'm just. He's probably got contingencies for that.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, let's.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Let's go. This is. This is the last thing we'll talk about, is mindset. And you. We've talked about some of the mindset stuff, and I. I do like your. Your mindset on things. Mindset is not about thinking positive thoughts and being happy. Mindset takes work and intentionality. You have to make a choice and take action. So talk about that a little bit.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So within all the, like, the changes and transitions that have happened this year, like we were talking about earlier, the partnership changes, the. I've had employee changes and things like that, I was actually talking to Kelsey one day on a call, and he's like. I have. He's like, dude. He's like, you have this innate ability that he talks to a lot of other attorneys and he's like, I don't see it in a lot of them where you pivot and move a lot faster than most people instead of kind of like sitting down in the muck and mire. Right. Of all of it. And I do think there's a moment where you need to sit and feel it, but then you got. You've got to move. And so for me, it's just one of those things of, like, I look at it as, like, what else are you going to do? You know, am I going to. I don't have enough time to have, like, a pity party for Chris or do whatever else. And if I did, like, I don't know what purpose it's serving. And so I consider myself a pretty. I'm a. I'm an eternal optimist. I talked to Joey a little while back about the idea of unrealistic optimism. It's this whole, like, Hermosi. Have you seen the Hermosius curve.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

No, but I want to hear, I want to hear more about the unrealistic optimism. I know what you're talking about, I.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Think, but it can. So it's this idea, I think for the longest time that's kind of where I was hitting it's shiny object. It's. Everything's great. You know what I mean? We're just. Because it's this thing too of like if you know the secret or other things, like if I will it what. I think a lot of that in the universe and everything else can be really, really helpful. But all of that stuff has to be in conjunction with action. And so that's where it takes intentionality and true work to actually, instead of me in my mindset just going, hey, you know, everything's just going to be great. Well, I've got to do those things too to help make everything be great. Right. We have to take action, we have to pivot, we have to move, we have to go. And so that's what shifted me from unrealistic, unrealistic optimism to kind of further down the S curve, which I can walk through.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Yeah, it's a lot like the mood follows action. Like the ritual stuff like mood follows action or. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Mood follows action. So you do have to do those things. It is important to have that positive mindset because if you've got that negative mind, it could be really damaging other things. But if, if you're with that unrealistic optimism, there's a lot of people that, that, you know, where they're always happy about. They're at least they, they project happiness.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Sure.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

I don't know if they're necessarily happy, but they can't figure out why they can't get it. They can't achieve anything.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Right.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Because they're not doing anything. And that's what I like about your post. Is it? I disagree with, you know, mindset is not about thinking positive thoughts. I think it's both. But the most important component of that, I think that's what you're getting at is taking the action.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah. Because I think people just think that if I think positive thoughts, everything will work out. And it's not. It's. Yeah, I don't. You can't just will it. Like you have. There's a, there's that extra component you need with it.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

At what point did you, did you learn that though? I can't assume you had it.

[Christopher Nicholas]

No, no, I think it's, I think it's just through. I think it's three Years of failing, honestly, like just messing up and, you know, falling down and, and then finally being able to get a little bit of momentum, right? You get a win and then you're like, okay, this can work. And then, okay, this can work. But I think if, through the years, if I hadn't, because, dude, there were, I mean, within my over five pages of jobs that I had on the bar application, like years of just going, why does every other person have this whole thing figured out? They all know what they want to be, but I can't figure this stuff out. And so it's this idea of, I had a good friend, he's an anesthesiologist. And I'm like, how the hell did he know at 18 he wanted to be an anesthesiologist? I didn't know what that was at 18. And yet it's because, you know, having parents or certain that circle right of like, and knowing people are like that. I didn't have that. And so it's just like, you try this and a lot of it for us early on was just survival. But then it's like, you do this and fail, do this and fail, do this and fail. And it's like then at some point it finally clicks because you just try so many times something just hits.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

You mentioned failure. So I do want to talk about that. Did you view your partnership as a failure?

[Christopher Nicholas]

No, even today I don't. There's things that. No, I don't. I mean, I think there's things, again, like I said that I wish I would have said earlier on, but now I don't feel it's a failure. So we each put like right, if I remember right, right around three grand in where we've been a seven figure company for the last four, four or five years. We consistently, I mean we have a team of about 16 and so. No, no, it's not a failure.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

So what I want to do is I like the way you were. You view that. So let's focus on the successes of that. And I, in my opinion, your best years are ahead of you. You're doing awesome things. When you look at that partnership, like, what are the, what are the things you're the most proud of?

[Christopher Nicholas]

So within the partnership. So I'll look at it. Can I look at it? Both the partnership and the business?

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Absolutely.

[Christopher Nicholas]

So I think within the partnership it was the experiences that we had together. It was the ability for him and I, you know, him and I are, you know, that me taking care Gretchen to all go to like certain events to go through. We went to a really interesting like emotional intelligence retreat. We've done, you know, trips together. The masterminds, Fishers, things like that. Like those pieces are pockets of memories that I have that were huge successes and that I look at as like I'm a big fan of like the experiences in life because those are the know I like stuff but like at the end of the day those, it's the experiences that those are the way I want, that's the way I want to look back on it. You know, if it's doing retreat with Melissa Velocity work or what have you, like doing those kind of things is the way I look at it as huge successes.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

What about the business?

[Christopher Nicholas]

The business. Honestly for me the biggest success is actually being an attorney who owns a law firm who has been able to fully transition out of having a caseload. I haven't had a case in over two and a half years and I love it. I think it's possible. I think anybody can do it if you want it. And I don't, I don't have the hang ups though of not having cases. I think if you have that, don't do it. If you want to do cases, do it. But for me that's a huge success because I, I really enjoy, I enjoy, I treat. So when people say like I feel lost without cases or clients. Treat your team like that, your teams, your clients like what are you going to do for them to help make it better? And so that's a huge success for me is like I consider myself a huge. Someone older. Well, I just turned 49 so like I consider myself a John Stockton of the firm now. Right. So just how can I assist? What can I do to help? What tool can I get you? You know, what information can I get you? But everybody else does this stuff and how can I watch that kind of thing just move and turn and so yeah, that's kind of been the stuff that that's the way I find it it to be successful.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Thanks Chris.

[Christopher Nicholas]

Yeah, thanks man.

[Gretchen Nicholas]

Appreciate it.