Joey Reiman: A Life on Purpose (#1)

Chuck Allen: 00:00:10

This podcast is about the choices people make when they want to change something about their life.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:15

Maybe to make it more meaningful or more satisfying.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:17

Maybe more money, maybe just cooler.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:24

Hey, friends.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:24

This is Chuck Allen and I want to welcome you to cool change.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:33

Our guest today is known around the world as one of the foremost thought leaders of our time.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:40

Get this fast.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:41

Company called him one of the top hundred people that will change the way the world thinks.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:46

And you're about to hear why.

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His name is Joey Ryman and he is a best selling author, a filmmaker, Ted speaker, a playwright, businessman, a philosopher.

Chuck Allen: 00:00:58

He's a professor at Emory, and I'm happy to say, a longtime friend of mine.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:03

For so many reasons, this guy is one of the coolest people you will ever meet.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:09

So I think you're going to want to take some notes on this one.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:12

Listen in on our conversation and Joey's going to be talking about everything from near death experiences to a brush with royalty to starting a fantastic company to the coolest thing he's ever done.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:26

We'll get to that later.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:28

And this conversation isn't just about all the stuff that Joey's done.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:33

The fact is you can google that.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:34

You can figure that out on your own.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:36

It's everywhere.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:38

What I'd like for you to do is listen in for how he thinks about change and about courage and our roles in this world versus our goals in this world.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:49

I think he's on a different level altogether.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:51

And I think you're really going to get a lot out of this show.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:55

I know I did.

Chuck Allen: 00:01:56

Before I forget, if you want to learn more about Joey and what he's up to these days, visit his website at brandnew studios.com.

Chuck Allen: 00:02:05

so without further ado, here's my conversation with Joey, recorded in his beautiful home in Atlanta, Georgia.

Chuck Allen: 00:02:18

When you think about who are the coolest people you know, and if I ask my small circle of friends, you're going to generally be at the top of the list.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:26

Well, maybe I'm just top of mind.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:28

You know, I think I stand for something.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:31

I stand for change.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:32

I stand for, you know, overthrowing the status quo.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:36

I stand for what I'd like to think, doing things that are courageous.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:40

But most importantly, I think what I've done is created my own narrative.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:46

And that's what people need to do more than.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:48

It's more important than anything to create your own story.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:51

Because if you don't define yourself, someone else will define you.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:55

That's what I've learned.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:56

And I see it all around me.

Joey Ryman: 00:02:58

I see it in business, I see it personally.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:01

Human beings are meaning seeking creatures.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:04

We are constantly looking to be part of a story, part of a narrative.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:09

And to understand narrative is to understand a life, because that's what your life is.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:15

And if you're stuck in one chapter, you can't close the book, you know?

Joey Ryman: 00:03:19

And when I get stuck in a chapter, I just, you know, move on to the next chapter.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:24

And I think that's maybe why I'm top of mind, because people see me as a.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:33

A symbol of change.

Chuck Allen: 00:03:35

You once said that, speaking of narrative, that all stories had four components.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:40

Yes.

Chuck Allen: 00:03:40

Generally, once upon a time, suddenly, fortunately, happily ever after.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:45

That's really good, Chuck, that you remember that.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:47

But that's so true, because that's what our lives are made of.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:50

And we have lots of those stories.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:52

I've had them all my life, where I started doing something that was like a.

Joey Ryman: 00:03:57

Felt like a fairy tale, then something unexpected, maybe horrific, happened, which is going to happen to all of us.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:04

But then, luckily, I either had a different perspective or someone shared their perspective with me, and then I got to live happily ever after until the next story.

Chuck Allen: 00:04:14

So in your experience, what is it that moves us from suddenly, when the horrific or the hard thing happens, the traumatic thing happens?

Chuck Allen: 00:04:22

What is the thing that helps you push past suddenly to luckily, perspective.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:28

It is one's perspective to see life, really, we see life as we are, not the way it is.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:36

And to have an optimistic perspective, to look at every challenge as an opportunity.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:43

It sounds glib, or it sounds like a cliche, but cliches are just truths told over and over again.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:51

And I think that if you see everything as a door instead of a wall, you're going to walk through lots of doors.

Joey Ryman: 00:04:58

And I've had my share of suddenlies and.

Chuck Allen: 00:05:03

But that perspective probably didn't just come out of thin air for you.

Chuck Allen: 00:05:08

It was shaped, it was molded.

Chuck Allen: 00:05:09

It came from someplace.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:10

I'll tell you exactly where did it come from.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:12

Yeah.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:12

It was: 1975

Joey Ryman: 00:05:19

My parents, of course, being jewish, thought I was going to go to medical school or law school.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:24

I did neither.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:25

I took on an internship for Federico Fellini, the great italian film director.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:30

Moved to Rome, Italy.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:31

I wasn't paid a dime.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:32

I got another job at a place called Fonoroma, dubbing pictures from Italian into English.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:38

And I got a dollar a sentence, but I'd only get maybe 20 sentences a week.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:44

But that was enough to sustain me.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:46

And while I was there, I met a princess, a real italian princess, Rosella.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:52

Frazza.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:54

And, you know, talk about it.

Joey Ryman: 00:05:57

Once upon a time, here I was with my script, working for Federico Fellini and going out with an italian princess, and I just imagined myself living in some castle in Rome and writing movies or making movies.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:10

And on our first outing, she hit a bus.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:15

She was driving.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:16

She hit a bus at about 50 miles an hour.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:18

That's what the newspaper said.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:20

And she had a friend in the car.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:22

Both girls were thrown in the car.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:24

I covered my face with my right arm, and my right arm got caught between two bucket seats because I was sitting in the back and was basically severed.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:32

I was paralyzed and rushed to the hospital.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:35

The paparazzi was there, and basically my parents showed up.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:39

And the doctors told my parents that I'll never be able to move my hand or my arm again.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:45

But, you know, that's why you have two arms.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:47

And they were making fun of it.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:49

It wasn't funny at all.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:51

I had, you know, dreamed about this, and all of a sudden, you know, the girls were fine, but I wasn't fine.

Joey Ryman: 00:06:57

And, you know, I thought, nobody will love me because I'm paralyzed and I'll never get a job.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:04

And I met a.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:09

A minister there who wasn't trying to convert me.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:13

He was actually a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:15

And he spent a good month with me in the hospital, and it changed my entire perspective on everything.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:23

He.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:24

He taught me that, you know, if you have an idea, which is the most important thing that you have in your life, and you create a habit with that idea, that idea will eventually.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:39

Will eventually change your character and ultimately your destiny.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:44

I had a miracle in the hospital.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:46

I got everything back.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:48

They said my hand would never move.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:50

I got 100% back.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:51

My arm wouldn't got 100% back.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:54

It was not a miracle of medicine.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:56

I'm positive about that.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:58

It was the medicine of miracles.

Joey Ryman: 00:07:59

And having a.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:01

Suddenly, that happened when you're 22 years old and having this.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:07

This font of hope and this minister, it just changed everything.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:11

And I made a deal with God that I would.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:13

That I would do something with my hand writing that would help the world, inspire the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:22

That's where that came from.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:25

So that was an.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:26

It was very early in my life that I got a big.

Chuck Allen: 00:08:29

Suddenly, when you think back over the life that you've lived, which has been extraordinary and it's been all over the world, are there other big pivotal changes, big suddenlies that came along, that when you look back, these were the key shapers of where you've arrived today?

Joey Ryman: 00:08:50

Yeah, that's a great question.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:52

Look, I think I repeated the story.

Joey Ryman: 00:08:56

There were plenty of sudden leaves in my life.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:01

The big ones were the hardest ones, where, you know, it had to be.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:06

It was a courageous move.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:07

I mean, I did very well in the marketing industry.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:10

I was a chief creative officer of a billion dollar advertise global advertising firm.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:15

And I started my own firm, which also became one of the top agencies in the United States known for its creativity.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:24

And that agency would grow into a quarter billion dollar agency, and a great one.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:34

In: 1995

Joey Ryman: 00:09:45

I felt like marketing was wrong, that any gift I had for writing, all I was doing was selling stuff, and people can't get enough of what they don't need.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:56

So that that was a.

Joey Ryman: 00:09:58

I think that's the philosophy of advertising.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:01

And I just put my life's work into it.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:04

And I realized I just couldn't sleep at night because I was just wasting my time.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:11

So I outplaced.

Chuck Allen: 00:10:14

This was sort of a crisis of.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:15

Meaning that you were having a total crisis of meaning.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:19

The first was the crisis of the body and the crisis of the heart and mind.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:23

But this was.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:24

Yeah, this was a crisis in meaning.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:26

And I realized I had to do something or I just could not sustain.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:35

I outplaced over 200 people in my agency.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:39

I fired all my clients except for children's hospital.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:45

And I started a little company called Bright House.

Joey Ryman: 00:10:48

It was: 1994

Joey Ryman: 00:10:59

And it was a radical concept because there was no advertising.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:02

It was all based on selling ideas and turning them into.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:06

I did it, and I figured that if the idea was good enough, people would pay enough.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:11

And at first, you know what?

Joey Ryman: 00:11:14

We just picked a number for an ideation platform, and it was much too high.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:20

I think Red lobster was my first client.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:21

And I asked for $450,000 and they said, we have 30.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:26

I said, okay, but strong negotiation skills there.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:30

Well, within ten years, we were for that same piece, that same strategy, that same the work of purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:39

We were charging a million dollars, and I no longer am with the company, but I understand the company now is charging a million, 6,000,007 for what Edna Morris, who was the CEO of Red Lobster, paid $30,000 for.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:54

So.

Joey Ryman: 00:11:55

But it was a big change, a big chance that I took because people thought, Joey Ryman is crazy.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:01

And I think that's important.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:03

Like when you hear that you're crazy from someone, that is the biggest clue that you're onto something.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:09

You know, mediocrity is self inflicted and genius is self imposed.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:14

And if you believe in what, what's in your heart instead of what is in your head, you are going to succeed tremendously.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:22

But the path from the mind to the heart is no easy journey.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:26

It takes an unlearning.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:29

You know, I told my kids schools when they were in grammar school that you have degeniused my children.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:37

That was in the fourth grade, because they were learning about how much, when, where, but who, but not why.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:43

And the why in your life is more important than anything.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:48

Who was it Mark Twain said, my favorite quote of all time was Mark Twain's.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:52

He said, the two most important days of your life are the day you were born and the day you find out why.

Joey Ryman: 00:12:58

And I would add to that, that you don't remember the day you're born.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:00

So the second day of finding out why is really the most important day in your life.

Chuck Allen: 00:13:05

And I've heard that from some other interviewees who are creatives, who are artists, and in this case, musicians, who said, look, there's something inside of you that's much greater than you, that is just dying to get out, and you are stopping it or you're not allowing it to come out.

Chuck Allen: 00:13:18

It sounded like you're saying as well, that the mind has ways of providing obstacles that the heart is trying to bust through.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:24

That's right.

Chuck Allen: 00:13:25

And is it an upbringing?

Chuck Allen: 00:13:27

Is it a socialization?

Chuck Allen: 00:13:28

Is it an education system that causes us to do that, that we can?

Joey Ryman: 00:13:34

Yeah, our education system is completely absurd.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:38

The idea of being taught the way we're taught is insanity.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:44

You know, I always revert back.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:46

I've been teaching at Emory now for 20 years at the business school.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:51

And what I teach my students is I lifted from Aristotle when he taught his students.

Joey Ryman: 00:13:56

He taught his students to identify and hone their unique talents and gifts.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:02

That was a two year program.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:04

The next two years, okay?

Joey Ryman: 00:14:06

The next two years, he challenged all of his students to go out and find the needs in the world where they could mitigate the ills of the world or fill the needs of the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:16

So if you think of it as a Venn diagram, in one circle are your unique gifts and talents, and the other circle is the needs of the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:25

At the intersection is what Aristotle called vocare.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:29

Vocare is a latin word for calling.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:32

And it's an important distinction because he didn't use the latin word for job or career, because he knew that both of those were too small for your spirit, your heart, as you would say.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:44

And Bokhare is a calling, and that's what, that's what calls us.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:49

That calling comes from the heart.

Joey Ryman: 00:14:51

Joseph Campbell, the great sociologist, is no longer with us, but was responsible for helping George Lucas put together Star wars.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:00

He talked about the hero's journey, and I'm very, very big on the hero's journey.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:05

We all live in ordinary worlds.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:08

We get a call.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:09

Most of us don't take the call, but if we take the call, that's when the fun begins, that's when the adventure begins, because you're reluctant, but hopefully you have a mentor, not a tour mentor, and they help you along with your allies, whether it's Harrison Ford or Harry Davis, it doesn't matter.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:24

But you must go on the adventure, and you go through the cave, what Campbell called the cave.

Joey Ryman: 00:15:31

And when you come out of the cave with the Excalibur or with the treasure, that's the treasure you bring to the world, and that's the hero's journey.

Chuck Allen: 00:15:39

Speaking of the hero's journey and Joseph Campbell, I mean, mythology, he's a famous mythologist.

Chuck Allen: 00:15:45

I've heard you refer to stories like the HErO's journey or to motifs like that.

Chuck Allen: 00:15:51

To what degree has myth and mythology and stories like that played a role in how you approach Life and How you approach BUsiNESS?

Joey Ryman: 00:15:59

100%.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:01

Stories are my arrows in my Quiver.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:04

And if I run out of arrows, I get more arrows.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:07

They're called stories, and that's how I've lived my life.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:12

We need to be part of Story.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:14

I mean, story is one of the most Undervalued.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:17

Well, it is the most undervalued concept in BUsinEss.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:22

And again, if you're the author of your own story, and author comes from the same latin root as authority, you get to write your own story.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:32

But we all have been taught to allow Other PeOPle to write our stories, and that is tragic.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:37

And those PeoPle, those people that I tell my students, be careful of, I call them the ThrEe p's, your peers, they'Ll AlWays tell you what to do.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:46

Your parents, they always want the best for you, which is not necessarily the best for you.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:51

It's often the best for them.

Joey Ryman: 00:16:53

And your professors, who seem to have some superior dogma, supernatural gift that's not real.

Joey Ryman: 00:17:01

And for the most part, they just pontificate.

Joey Ryman: 00:17:05

So again, it's very important to be with yourself and to explore your heart and not necessarily your mind, because your mind is really what makes you worry, and that's where fear comes from, and that's where the idea of competition comes from, and that's where the idea of otherness comes from.

Joey Ryman: 00:17:26

But your heart is so pure, you just need to hear it.

Joey Ryman: 00:17:30

And by the way, the word ear is in the word heart, so there's another clue for you.

Chuck Allen: 00:17:36

I'm glad you said that.

Chuck Allen: 00:17:37

This idea of narrative has been my mind a lot lately, because we've been learning about the difference between fact and narrative.

Chuck Allen: 00:17:46

And Eckhart Tolle, in particular, has been really instrumental lately in helping me understand that this idea of the isness of.

Chuck Allen: 00:17:54

Now, if we were to take the present moment into account and we were to eliminate the narrative from our head in that moment, all of the stories, the narratives, that generally, when we conjure up something, it's not always the most positive, glowing, proactive sort of story.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:09

Sometimes we fill in that void with things which are not.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:12

They are negative or they are scary.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:14

And when we sit in a moment and we have fear, fear based emotions, the idea is that if you could eliminate the.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:21

Those stories out of your head for just a moment and understand what is, and you look around and you recognize that you're okay in that moment and that you're almost always okay in that moment and sometimes better than that.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:36

And so the idea of narrative or creating stories is interesting to me when we talk about this storyline arc that you've just.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:45

That you've mentioned to me many times.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:48

Once upon a time, suddenly, luckily, oftentimes that feels like something that's happening to you.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:53

Once upon a time, I was born here.

Chuck Allen: 00:18:55

Suddenly, this thing happened to me, and then, proactively, luckily, this happened.

Chuck Allen: 00:19:01

And I'm just, you know, thinking out loud here.

Chuck Allen: 00:19:03

It makes me think, are there narratives that we can create for our lives which are not ones that happened to us?

Chuck Allen: 00:19:10

Can we, or should we ever consider creating our own suddenly?

Chuck Allen: 00:19:14

Is that even possible?

Joey Ryman: 00:19:17

Yeah, I think that people do that.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:19

I think, you know, I think back to building bright house that was my own.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:24

I brought that on to myself.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:25

You know, I thought I.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:28

The last thing I want to do is become homogenized or pasteurized.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:33

So when I feel like things are going swimmingly well, I bring a suddenly into my own life.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:42

And we all do that sometimes you're not as fortunate to bring your own suddenly in and you have a car accident or you get ill, and that's from the outside.

Joey Ryman: 00:19:52

But there are people who believe you bring that onto yourself as well.

Chuck Allen: 00:19:57

We're all living through a huge suddenly right now, on several different fronts.

Chuck Allen: 00:20:02

I wonder what your counsel might be for all of the listeners here who are going through this huge, suddenly, all of us together.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:12

Yeah.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:13

So there's terror in the world, there's sickness in the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:19

The world many of many countries are on, are teetering economically, and our planet is in peril.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:27

That's a lot of suddenlies.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:29

But the worst suddenly of all is a crisis in meaning, and that is existential, pervasive and insidious and daily.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:39

So forgive me, but I think that's what we need to be focused on.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:46

Why are we here?

Joey Ryman: 00:20:48

How can we mitigate the ills of the world?

Joey Ryman: 00:20:51

By understanding what our role in the world is, not what our goal in the world is.

Chuck Allen: 00:20:56

And that's how we get to the luckily.

Chuck Allen: 00:20:58

The fortunately?

Joey Ryman: 00:20:59

Yeah.

Joey Ryman: 00:20:59

If you're insistent enough and persistent enough, you'll get to the luckily, because if you find out why you're here and it can help other people, as Aristotle pointed out, then you will have done your part in healing the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:13

And that's what we need.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:16

We need to search our hearts for kindness and compassion and empathy.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:21

And when we do that, we are then equipped to heal.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:26

Not sell, but heal.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:28

And again, that's a big shift.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:30

It's a pivot from what is my goal to what is my role?

Joey Ryman: 00:21:33

But that's an enormous pivot.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:35

And by the way, if you think about your role versus your goal, it's a lot more exciting.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:40

I mean, you're in there.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:42

You're in the great arena of possibility.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:45

And what you can do from there is just.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:48

It's remarkable and mystical and wonderful and enriching.

Chuck Allen: 00:21:55

And the idea then is to focus more on the role than the goal.

Joey Ryman: 00:21:59

Absolutely.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:00

What is my role on this planet?

Joey Ryman: 00:22:02

Not my goal on this planet.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:04

I don't need to be an astronaut.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:06

But how can I lift people out of this world and give them an idea of what the stars look like?

Joey Ryman: 00:22:13

If you think, if you play the game of goal and roll, you'll find different words and a different narrative and a different story, a much more exciting story, a hero story.

Chuck Allen: 00:22:25

You know, as you think about the pivots and the changes that and the suddenlies that you went through, did they always seem as though they were a step forward to you, or did it sometimes seem like it was a step sideways or maybe even backwards?

Joey Ryman: 00:22:38

Well, all the above, because you get scared.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:44

And, you know, it's not always easy to turn the word scared into excited, but actually, it's very healthy to do that when you're scared.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:56

Cortisol is released in your body.

Joey Ryman: 00:22:59

When cortisol hits your adrenal glands, that's basically the beginning of the end of your life.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:03

My father actually died of adrenal cancer, so I know a bit about that.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:09

When you're excited, the cortisol isn't released, but something called dopamine is released.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:16

And dopamine is the best dope in the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:19

It gets you.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:21

It's attached to the word exhilaration.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:23

So when you feel exhilarated, what's happening is that dopamine is being released in your body.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:28

When you feel anxious, it means the cortisol is released.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:32

So you pick your drug of choice.

Joey Ryman: 00:23:34

I prefer dopamine.

Chuck Allen: 00:23:36

Well, then it probably means that you're not scrolling through sort of doomsday feeds every night and every morning on your phone.

Chuck Allen: 00:23:45

So instead of doing that, which many people right now can't help but just scroll through sort of the doomsday literature that comes across in the media right now, what are you filling yourself with inside, practically, what are you looking at?

Chuck Allen: 00:23:57

What are you reading?

Joey Ryman: 00:23:57

What are you consuming?

Joey Ryman: 00:23:59

Inspiring biographies.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:01

Other people's stories.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:02

I love biographies because when they're really done well, you can see how we're really on the same path and basically walking all of us home.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:12

And it's really.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:13

I just love inspiring biographies, stories of heroes and iconoclasts.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:19

You find that, you know, Walter Isaacson is very good at writing books like that, whether it's Steve Jobs or Leonardo da Vinci.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:25

He has both a historical and a mystical perspective.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:30

And I think inspiring biographies are the antidote to this worry.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:37

You know, I mean, worry is.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:39

I mean, think about worry for a moment.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:40

It's really a form of atheism.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:42

It's, as I tell my students, stop being warriors, be warriors.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:48

And the literature you're reading better be about warriors, not warriors, because those are the real haves and have nots.

Joey Ryman: 00:24:58

The ones who become warriors have fire.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:03

They've been struck.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:04

They almost have an instructive spark of fire that they learned from someone or something came up in the middle of the night, or they read something.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:14

And that instructive spark of fire is what creates a flame in your heart or a spark in your heart which actually provides warmth in your life, but it also provides light in your life.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:25

And again, you mentioned mythology.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:29

Mythology is magnificent to read because it's really the early narratives of life, the wisdom from the ancients.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:37

And I'm big on reading about the ancients, too.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:40

The reason their words echo today is because they were so profound yesterday.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:47

So for me, biographies ancients, the classics, the humanities, that's where, that's where the, that's where you can step.

Joey Ryman: 00:25:57

That's what the precipice of optimism and a better, bigger life are.

Chuck Allen: 00:26:02

So that's where you're finding warriors oftentimes in mythology.

Chuck Allen: 00:26:05

But are there warriors that are alive and walking among us today?

Chuck Allen: 00:26:09

And if so, who do you point to as being those warriors today?

Joey Ryman: 00:26:15

Most of them, the new superheroes for me are scholars and academics.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:21

I think that's where I go.

Chuck Allen: 00:26:24

I'm not a modern day philosophers.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:26

Yeah, modern day philosophers.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:29

I'm Alan Boudin and Esther Perel.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:34

You know, you want to go to an Esther Perel YouTube.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:40

You listen to her.

Chuck Allen: 00:26:41

She's a warrior.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:42

She's a warrior.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:43

And there are warriors in business, too, the heroes in business.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:47

Part of what's happened with COVID is that it's awakened the hearts in so many, in so many chief executives.

Joey Ryman: 00:26:55

And what we're finding, what I'm finding is that at the heart of every great organization is a CEO with a heart, and that's very different.

Joey Ryman: 00:27:06

Again, going back to goals and rolls from a CEO who's got collateral damage because of some economic downturn.

Joey Ryman: 00:27:15

This is not about economics.

Joey Ryman: 00:27:17

It's about humanity.

Chuck Allen: 00:27:19

Let's shift gears a little bit, because something that's been fascinating to me about you is that wherever you have ever been lived, worked that I've witnessed, you've created an environment, this ethereal environment, oftentimes marked by white, bright, stark colors, but beautiful design.

Chuck Allen: 00:27:41

Can you help me understand, and therefore our listeners understand the role of place, the role of design and aesthetic in your life?

Chuck Allen: 00:27:50

Because it seems to me that it must play a pretty key role, enormous role.

Joey Ryman: 00:27:57

You know, we're all flowers in some pot, and it's important what the pot looks like and feels like.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:04

And, you know, I've, wherever I've worked, I've tried to create an environment that's open.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:10

You say white, stark white, so that there aren't the kind of distractions or the kind of somberness that you often find in law firms.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:22

Law firms are somber.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:24

That's not heavy.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:25

Heavy and somber.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:27

And, you know, I don't, you know, it's a great question.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:33

I do think environment is important.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:35

Fresh flowers are important.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:36

Fresh juice is important.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:41

A place where you can have an unconditional response is important.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:46

Let me give you the best example.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:49

You know, being jewish, and I love being jewish.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:53

I go to temple.

Joey Ryman: 00:28:54

There's one big, big downside of being jewish, though, from an environmental point of view, synagogues, are not usually architecturally inspiring, though.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:07

I'm jewish, when I need an idea or I need inspiration, I go to one of three or four churches in Atlanta that are designed.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:16

Well.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:16

They're designed based on Noah's ark turned upside down, but the spires inspire me, and I feel.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:24

I feel a bigger connection with what people can't see.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:28

Love, faith, courage.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:31

You know, all these things are ineffable.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:33

But in church, I feel like I'm connected.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:36

And it has very little to do with Jesus or Moses.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:40

It's really the environment.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:42

I mean, if I could build.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:44

You know, I've often thought about in my early days, early career of moving my company into a church.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:51

It never really worked out.

Joey Ryman: 00:29:52

Tried it a couple times, but any place that I'm part of, I want to feel inspired and design.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:04

You know, Steve Jobs made design really famous.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:07

I mean, that was his whole thing, that well designed and is well told.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:13

And it's very, very important to get a good interior designer or decorator and be mindful of what you're looking at all the time.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:22

You know, if you look at my artwork, most of it's pretty optimistic, and I want to smile.

Chuck Allen: 00:30:27

And it's uncluttered.

Chuck Allen: 00:30:28

I mean, the sense is, look, when we think about the coolest spaces I've seen, these have been spaces that you have designed and created or had designed and created and then thrive inside those spaces.

Chuck Allen: 00:30:40

I don't think it's any accident that these are spaces that are uncluttered, that they are bright, that they are hopeful, that they're inspiring, because it seems to lend something to the person who created it, that that is the way that they think.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:52

Well, and plus, we have so much clutter in the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:55

There's so much noise.

Joey Ryman: 00:30:57

And another key attribute of creating is this notion of being in quiet.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:06

People have stopped listening to people and including them, their own selves.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:12

And I, again, I tell my students the word listen and the word silent have the same letters, and that's another clue.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:20

There's so many clues in words that people are not mindful of.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:24

I think you were just born with a natural knack to twist words, to have puns.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:28

I mean, you're formidable when it comes to a pun war.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:30

I've tried.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:33

It's the copywriting skills gone wild.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:35

Gone amok.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:36

Yeah.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:37

Let's talk a little bit about and help our listeners understand.

Chuck Allen: 00:31:39

What are you up to today?

Joey Ryman: 00:31:41

Well, for 25 years, with the building of Bright House, I created and perfected the methodology for finding for a company excavating their own purpose, articulating that purpose and activating that purpose today.

Joey Ryman: 00:31:57

Or as in the last 18 months, I've opened a new firm with the former president of Turner Entertainment, Brad Siegel, who created Turner classic movies, TNT, Adult Swim, Cartoon Network.

Joey Ryman: 00:32:12

He's made over 300 films, and he, too, feels that the world, that business, can be more purposeful.

Joey Ryman: 00:32:17

We got together 18 months ago and decided to open a company that would reflect a new order in the world, hence the name brand new World Studios, because it's a brand new world.

Joey Ryman: 00:32:29

And our thought was that instead of making or focusing just on internal programs around internal purpose, that the idea of purpose had to escape the four walls of an organization.

Joey Ryman: 00:32:44

So we hypothesized, and it's come true, that Fortune 500 companies would actually pay to create stories based on their own purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:32:56

So purposes of courage, compassion, endurance, perseverance, heroism, not necessarily about their company, but about, again, their role in the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:09

And these films would positively impact people's lives.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:16

And these films would be shown at the box office, at theaters, they would be streamed, because we've got a whole new thing called streaming platforms.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:25

And companies could finally tell their story externally to inspire people to live brighter, better, brand new lives.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:38

And we have two films in production.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:41

One is a documentary about the Swarovski family.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:47

People know the story, but they don't know the story.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:49

It's a remarkable story of one family over six generations that basically brought sparkle to the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:33:55

And in times like this, times like Covid, that's what people want to see.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:01

It goes back to my notion of biographies.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:03

This is a living biography on the screen.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:06

The other film we're working on is a film with BMW about the race for the electric car and saving the planet.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:12

Because it's not necessarily the race.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:15

It's certainly not a car race film.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:16

It's a race for the car.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:17

But it, but what it led, what it will lead to is actually saving the planet by electrifying the world.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:24

And the film itself is electrifying.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:25

So those are two productions going on right now, and in addition to another one that we're co producing with Fortune magazine about the new renaissance that's coming.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:37

A new renaissance.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:38

We had the 15th century Renaissance.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:40

It was an explosion of creativity.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:42

Out of it came printing and shipping and arthem, public space and architecture.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:46

We're about to have that again.

Joey Ryman: 00:34:48

So for those creative people out there, this is going to be an incredible few decades coming, because all the factors that led to the renaissance in the 15th century are happening once again.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:01

And this film, it's called why is Mona Lisa smiling?

Joey Ryman: 00:35:05

The reimagination of the corporation.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:07

And the reason, by the way, that Mona Lisa was smiling is that Leonardo da Vinci did something no other painter ever in our history did, which was put a smile on a person because he believed that a new era of optimism was coming, as I believe that, too.

Chuck Allen: 00:35:24

You have been called the father of purpose because you have written books on it, you've spoken about it.

Chuck Allen: 00:35:29

You've been in Davos, you have helped organizations and built organizations around purpose.

Chuck Allen: 00:35:33

What about the role of purpose in Joey Ryman's life?

Joey Ryman: 00:35:37

To be proposive or to have purpose buffers you from all the suddenlies.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:42

I mean, you'll get through them if you have a purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:45

Nietzsche said, if you have a why, you can deal with any what, who, when or where that comes at you.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:50

I'm an enormous believer in that.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:52

And my purpose is to inspire others to excavate their own purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:57

You know, I do this with my students.

Joey Ryman: 00:35:59

You know, it's a class called ideation 441 about corporate purpose, but it's really a class about them finding their own purpose, finding their own why, you know, blocking out the barbs of their parents and their professors and their peers.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:15

Brighthouse.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:16

It was all about finding a company, finding their purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:19

And now, brand new world, I believe, is a world where people have greater purpose and people are more compassionate, and kindness is much more important.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:33

Or I should say the prophets, p r o p h e t s, are more important than the prophets.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:40

P r o f I t s.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:43

That's what people need today.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:45

They want leadership, they want friendship, they want kinsmanship.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:50

I mean, this is.

Joey Ryman: 00:36:51

All the ships are sailing and they're all incredible.

Chuck Allen: 00:36:58

Well, look, if I were.

Chuck Allen: 00:36:59

This is not a scientific question, but if I were to ask you, what is the coolest thing you've ever done?

Chuck Allen: 00:37:04

What comes to mind?

Joey Ryman: 00:37:05

Being witness to birth.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:08

The birth of my two boys.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:10

That's about the coolest thing I've ever done.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:12

I mean, there are things way down the ladder, but that you can't.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:15

You can't beat that.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:16

You just.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:17

That's divinity.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:18

That's.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:18

That is the ultimate, that the children are up there.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:24

I mean, way down the list.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:25

You mentioned Davos.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:26

That was just as a career piece of a career, to speak, to be the keynote speaker at the World Economic Forum.

Chuck Allen: 00:37:34

Yeah.

Chuck Allen: 00:37:34

A bit of a high watermark.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:35

Yeah, that was a high water mark.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:36

500 CEO's looking at you very discerningly.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:40

And that was surreal.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:44

And I got to tell, coming full circle here, I got to tell not just my story, but the story of purpose and how important, you know, the notion of being focused on the business of life versus the life of businesses.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:56

And I think it had some real impact.

Joey Ryman: 00:37:58

And it was one of the sparks that created that perpetuated this tsunami we call purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:03

Because when I started selling purpose, people thought, I remember the CEO of Home Depot.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:10

I went to see him, and he thought I was selling him a multipurpose cleaner.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:15

I mean, he had no idea.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:16

Nobody knew anything about burp.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:18

Now I go into Kroger, and there's a sign that says, peace with purpose.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:22

So we've come a long, long way.

Chuck Allen: 00:38:24

Right?

Chuck Allen: 00:38:24

The vernacular has changed through corporate America, for sure.

Chuck Allen: 00:38:27

Well, as we wrap up here, missed opportunities along the way.

Chuck Allen: 00:38:32

Were there any.

Chuck Allen: 00:38:33

How did you miss them?

Chuck Allen: 00:38:34

If there were?

Joey Ryman: 00:38:35

I don't.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:36

You know what?

Joey Ryman: 00:38:37

I don't know what?

Joey Ryman: 00:38:37

I don't know, and I'm sure there have been, but I don't know them.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:41

My life, you know, been a bunch of chapters and has been really exciting and remarkable.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:48

I've got to meet some of the most incredible people in the world, and I've.

Joey Ryman: 00:38:55

So I don't know what I've missed.

Chuck Allen: 00:38:58

I'd love for you to put a plug in for a minute about your son Julian, and what he's doing right now, because when I think about some of the coolest projects going on right now and what he's up to and how young he is and how much energy is going into this and how much support, can you just give us a sense of what he is up to right now?

Joey Ryman: 00:39:12

Yeah, he's up to a lot.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:13

You know, he's a yemenite getting his master's at Trinity College at Cambridge, which is.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:19

I'm very proud.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:21

And he's proud.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:21

We're all proud of him.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:23

And he's looking to be a intern for one of the candidates running this November.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:30

But what he's doing right now is putting together a show.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:35

I think it's eat with your mouth full.

Chuck Allen: 00:39:37

Eat with your mouth full.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:38

Yeah, eat with your mouth full.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:40

And his notion is that the distance that we have among us, among peoples, can be mitigated by just sitting across a table and having a meal.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:50

It's sort of Anthony Bourdain meets millennials meets.

Chuck Allen: 00:39:57

Meets immigration policy.

Joey Ryman: 00:39:58

Meets immigration policy.

Chuck Allen: 00:39:59

It's about immigrant chefs, if I'm.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:01

That's right, immigrant chefs who make these amazing meals invite a disparate group of people who all have.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:10

Who have conversations, delicious conversations, over delicious meals, and learn from that meal.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:18

And I think it's so beautiful.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:22

And he's about to launch it.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:24

He's talking to some investors now.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:26

But it's just a beautiful show created by two beautiful people, my son, Julian Rymandae, and his partner Farah, who's syrian, and of course, Julian's Jewish.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:38

So it's got a lot of great pieces to it.

Chuck Allen: 00:40:41

Yeah, yeah.

Chuck Allen: 00:40:42

I can't wait to see what comes out of that.

Chuck Allen: 00:40:44

Well, I was going to ask you as a final question, what is the next coolest thing that you're going to do?

Chuck Allen: 00:40:51

Sounded like, though, it might be this project with BMW, with Swarovski and also with the Renaissance project.

Joey Ryman: 00:40:57

Yeah, I'm doing a, what I was meant to do, you know, again, as we wrap up to go full circle, you know, I started with Federico Fellini and my script called RSVP.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:10

It was a story about 200 international debutantes who get kidnapped by two jewish terrorists and they're held hostage at the Plaza Hotel until the Middle east would come to an agreement.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:21

That film never got made.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:23

It got me to Rome and it got Fellini's eye.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:27

But when I went there, something in me wanted to make films I didn't want to.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:32

Something in me prevented me from going to law school or med school.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:35

And I got somewhat diverted.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:38

Now, advertising was a great industry and I got to make hundreds, almost probably a thousand small films called tv commercials.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:47

But I really always wanted to make films and make stories that would.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:52

That would change people's lives and get them to stand up and cheer.

Joey Ryman: 00:41:57

And so for those of you who think you have to find your purpose, like today, in a way, it's taken me over 60 years to find mine.

Joey Ryman: 00:42:05

So just be patient, but be mindful and most importantly, be heartful.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:12

Well, Joey, thank you for your time.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:13

I can tell you that every time I spend any time at all with Joey Ryman, one thing is for sure, and that is I leave thinking differently and I leave thinking bigger and more inspired, not just because of the spaces that we get to sit in, but because of who you are and how you think and we love you and your energy.

Joey Ryman: 00:42:29

I love you, too.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:30

Thank you.

Joey Ryman: 00:42:30

Thank you.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:34

So what did you think about that?

Chuck Allen: 00:42:38

What did you take away from that?

Chuck Allen: 00:42:41

One of my favorite parts was the idea that we focus more on our role than our goal.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:47

And that aligns a whole lot with some of my own teachings and what I study.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:52

And I just absolutely love the conversation.

Chuck Allen: 00:42:55

And I'll be listening to this several times more and seeing what I can apply.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:01

I'd love to get your feedback what was helpful for you.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:05

If you put those in the comments or send me a note directly and I'll share with Joey anything that you'd like for me to share with him as well, or reach out to him directly.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:13

You've got his website again.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:15

That website is brandnew worldstudios.com.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:20

i really want to thank you for joining me today.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:23

This is a brand new podcast and so any feedback that you have for me is much appreciated.

Chuck Allen: 00:43:28

Thanks again and join me next time as we find some more folks who are embarking on their own cool change.