At 18 Jimmy Tarasavage got a job at a local Irish pub called Meg O’Malley’s. Several years later, he transitioned to another restaurant owned by the same group, Long Doggers, a local hot dog and wing joint. He stayed with this company ever since, hopping between the two restaurants. In 2015, he was able to partner with his former bosses to open Hemingway’s Tavern, a Key West themed restaurant in Melbourne, Florida.
I’m so excited to have with me the most random connection that you could possible come up with, which of course, we love the synchronicities. Jimmy Tarasavage is with us today. Hi, Jimmy. Welcome to the show.
Hi. Thanks for having me. Awesome to be here.
Jimmy and I connected because Justin and I ended up in a restaurant in Melbourne, Florida when we were out there for a business conference, Shannon Gronich’s Business Acceleration Summit. We were sitting at this restaurant called Hemingway’s Tavern. It is the coolest place ever. You just sit there going, “Wow. These people did this right.” Jimmy happened to be there that day, one of the owners of it. This guy is phenomenal. Of course, we get to talk about superpowers and how they even came up with the concept for Hemingway’s Tavern. Really excited that you joined us on the show, Jimmy. Thank you so much.
Really, it’s nice to be here. Thank you so much for having me.
Let’s just jump right in and talk about, what are your superpowers?
Connects Us: It’s gotten me where I am today, to be able to connect with people and create a rapport.
I thought I had a unique superpower. I did take your online quiz, which is awesome by the way. My power is energy manipulation, which I do agree to, to an extent. I’m pretty adept at directing energy and putting it where I need to. What I think that I do really well is I have the ability to connect with people, and really quickly and really deeply, more than your average person. Whether you’re young, whether you’re old, whether you’re homeless or you’re a professional, man, woman, black, white, I feel I have the ability to connect with almost anybody. I’ve proved this over and over again through my experiences with people. I do work at my restaurant, so I meet all different kinds of people in all walks of life all the time. It’s really useful. It’s gotten me where I am today, to be able to connect with people and to be able to create a rapport. It is by sharing the same experiences and the same emotions and the same struggles that you’re able to find common ground with people. By doing that, you’re able to break down barriers and you’re able to build rapport. I think that’s what my superpower is, connecting with people.
I absolutely would agree with that. You just have that confidence and that aura about you. It comes across. A lot of that comes from just a genuine interest in people. Would you say that that’s how it works?
It’s 100% true, because everybody’s got a story. Everybody’s got a background. Everybody’s got something that you’ve never heard before. Everybody’s got a different paradigm, if you will, which is a phrase that I learned from the late Stephen Covey. Everybody’s got a different paradigm that you don’t even know about. Just by taking the time to understand some people, not only are you going to enjoy yourself, you could very well expand your own mind and you could learn some things you never knew about and just experience things you never experienced before. It is a little self-serving but at the same time it’s gotten me to where I am today. I really enjoy it.
Let’s look at our interaction. Here we are sitting at this restaurant. Justin and I just have a huge appreciation for life and the details of life and the nuances in life, and what people created and everybody’s paradigms and this and that. We’re sitting there. The atmosphere was fantastic. We’re having a great time together. We’re like, “This is a really amazing concept. How did they come up with this?” It’s just that intriguing curiosity. We just asked the question, “Who owns this place? How did this come about?” Our server, who’s phenomenal, she was so fantastic. She was absolutely amazing. She’s like, “Jimmy is here.” I was like, “Sure, let’s talk to Jimmy.” Here we are, we don’t know each other. You could easily be like, “What do you want? What’s going on? They’re going to complain about the food.” It was like, “Let’s just talk.” We talked for one and a half hour.
We did. We ended up having a very nice conversation. We went in all kinds of directions, which was great. I was talking to you. I remember when you said you had a counterintelligence experience. Who knew that I was going to just be talking to one of my guests and they were going to tell me they had counterintelligence experience. That’s why you do these. That’s why you go out there and you reach out, you make these connections, because you don’t know what these people have done.
Connects Us: You reach out, you connect, because you don’t know what these people have done.
Just to affirm what you’re feeling, I am very clear that that’s the only reason I have that experience in this lifetime, is because it intrigues people enough to get them to listen to me. I’m super, super clear that that’s why I chose that trajectory. It’s been a blast. Really, as intriguing as you think that my background is, the super intriguing part to me, I want you to really talk about, how you came up with this concept? I know the restaurant industry is pretty simple, serve food, people like the food, they come back. But there’s so much more to it. What you did was you actually created a really cool experience, almost without being obvious. It’s not like a rainforest cafe or like you’re being slapped in the face with it. It didn’t feel overpowering. It felt complimentary to the experience. That’s an art. That’s a very artistic expression of something, to be able to get into that space. Talk to us about how all that came about.
I’ll start from beginning. First off, before I get going any further, I want to give a big shout out to our designer, his name is Jim McMillan. He is a phenomenal guy. He is a true artist in every sense of the word. He’s a little bit crazy, which is probably why I like him so much. Not only is he a designer, he’s a musician, he’s a writer, he’s a sculptor. He’s a painter. He’s a true artist. He’s got this unique ability to not only have a vision, but he’s got the technical knowledge about how to get there. Big shout out to Jim McMillan. He handpicked and designed the entire interior of that restaurant, of course, with our guidance and giving him a vision and end goal. That’s number one. Jim McMillan, amazing man. He’s got a business called McFuture.
Where can we send people to find him? Is there a website with McFuture?
McFuture.net. To give you a little bit of background starting from the beginning, how I came up with this concept was, first and foremost, I have a deep, deep love and appreciation for the City of Key West. Key West is what Hemingway’s Tavern is based on. It’s a Key West themed restaurant. I love that city. It’s got this rare combination of history and mystique. People from all over the world are there. It’s a great, little town. I love it. That’s the beginning. The second part is I’ve been working for the same company now for about fifteen years. They’re one company that is combined. It’s called Meg O’Malleys, it’s an Irish pub in Melbourne, Florida, and Long Doggers Eateries. Long Doggers Eateries is a small chain we have here in Brevard County, Florida. It’s a hot dog and wing place, really, really nice, local beach-y joint.
I worked with these guys for a long time. They were working on a third project. The third project has not come into fruition and it may not, but it was a New Orleans-themed restaurant. I’m thinking about these guys. I’m thinking about what they’ve done. They have taken locations. Each one of them has taken a location. The Irish pub is based on Ireland. The Long Doggers restaurant is based on the beach. The New Orleans restaurant is based on the city in Louisiana. These were all places that were based on locations. Very, very simple. I say, “What location do I love more than anything? It’s Key West.” It’s my escape town. It’s where I go to relax. I feel that’s not uncommon. A lot of people really love Key West, especially where I am.
Where I live in Melbourne, Florida, we are about six hours from Key West. People here, they know Key West. Most people have been there. We are just far enough away where you can’t really go on a day trip. We are so close to where they can’t fake it. People have been there. If I try to make a New York restaurant down here, people would think it’s hokey. I could have whatever. If I wanted to a Chicago-whatever restaurant, people might not have been to Chicago or know what it’s about. But here, majority of people in this area have been there. They know it. You can’t fake it. You can’t be like a Rainforest Cafe where it’s in your face and it’s overwhelming and it’s not subtle.
I wouldn’t say we’re subtle. We got a nine-foot elephant head statue sticking at one of our walls. We’re not exactly subtle. At the same time, Jim did such a good job in arranging it in such a way so it’s not forced. It seems like it’s natural. If you’ve been to Key West, it is such an eclectic town. Again, my love of people and connecting with people, I go there and just meet people from all over the Earth. It’s not like you’re just going and meeting people that are in town from Miami drinking for the weekend. You’re meeting Russians. You’re meeting people from Japan. You’re meeting people from Brazil. You’re meeting people from all over the country, in the world. It is really cool to just sit next to a bar stool and have a, “Where are you from? Romania. Really? What brings you here?”
In a nut shell, that is how the concept came to fruition. It was a passion for a city that people around here really, really love. Also, I gleamed off a common thread from all of the restaurants that I’ve been involved in previously. It was very serendipitous, if you will. I was in this lawn guard company for years and years. My partner that I have now was my former boss. He actually approached me. He was like, “I need you to come up with a concept idea. We got this opportunity.” I’m like, “Okay.” It wasn’t forced, but at the same time I was charged with doing something. I had a couple of ideas that got shut down first. Rightfully so. They were weak and not good enough. I like being pushed to the next level.
Connects Us: It just somehow came together in just a serendipitous way.
I was actually approached to make a restaurant. I always had ideas in my head. It just somehow came together in just a serendipitous way, just like our meeting. It just happened in that exact same thread. Jim McMillan, our amazing designer who made this place come to life, he randomly introduced himself to my partner at one of his restaurants and just said, “Hey, I heard about you. I want to work with you.” That was it. That’s how we connected with this guy. It just came out of the blue. It couldn’t have been a better match. I’m not especially a spiritual guy, but sometimes these things happen where you’re like, “That is so random and amazing and perfect. It just seems meant to be.”
We talk a lot about synchronicities because I’m becoming more and more convinced that if you will intelligently design certain aspects, it’s like talking about the counterintel thing. There’s no rational explanation for how I ended up in that field in a very random way. It makes total sense with the work I do now. It wasn’t an obvious connection at all based on what I had done previously. There are threads, but it’s only taking that 50-foot perspective or in retrospect to be able to go, “This makes perfect sense.” In the moment, it’s a seemingly series of random events. Then you see it together, you’re like, “I don’t know. I can’t at this point of time say that it’s anything but some sort of design.”
To say that it’s random, I would have such a hard time believing that at this point, even how my husband and I met, the series of events, the choices that were made. We play with those concepts a lot at Super Power Experts because it would stand to reason that if that exists, if there are synchronicities and there is some creative element going onto it, if we can understand that and master it, it would make sense that then we would be able to create what comes next. That’s that multidimensional mastery piece that we like to play with. What would happen if we were in full awareness of what we were creating in the moment or even prior to the moment rather than having to wait for retrospection to see it?
You’re getting into some of that secret territory now, where you envision your future. That’s where you’re going to go. There is something to be said about that. I do believe in hard work and I do believe in pushing and learning and growing. At the same time, vision is a huge part of that, having your eye on a goal and pushing yourself to go there. That’s a big part of it. You need to be able to envision things. You need to be able to push yourself towards those things. There is a certain thing to be said about being able to visualize things in your head. I think there is a certain element of truth to that, for sure.
For me, I feel like I moved into another phrase where it’s an up-leveling of even the visioning. I really do believe and feel I exist in that paradigm that is being created while it’s being created. It’s so fascinating to be in awareness of it. The way I explain to people is like you’re existing in this world that you’re creating, yet you’re constantly having to look here, if you will, wherever here is, for the clues that you’ve left. Because if you don’t attend to the details here, then you actually thwart the possibility of that existence happening. Does that make sense?
A little bit, yes.
It goes beyond even visioning. You have to eat, breathe and sleep and totally embody this as though there’s no other possible reality other than this one that you are experiencing in order for it to really come into fruition.
That’s the power of focus right there. That’s the power of really just honing in on a single, whether it would be goal or element or facet, or whatever it may be, if you can focus your energy and your power. Like I said, there is just so much we don’t know. It’s amazing how crazy things come together when you focus. It’s amazing how there’s a tunnel vision where things come together. Who knows what’s going on that we can’t see, the shadows that are not dancing on the wall? Who knows the connectedness that we are experiencing we don’t even know about? You’re just thinking about somebody, and the phone rings, they’re calling. You’re like, “What the hell is that shit?” That’s some weird stuff. It’s something. It would be one thing if it happened once or twice, but that happens to you. I was just thinking about this person and they texted, like “What’s going on here?” You’re right in that aspect.
For me, we could be wrong. I often sit and think, because I like to do the whole what if concepts in its entirety. What if we’re wrong? What if there’s no multiverse? What if none of these concepts are true? What if we’re making all of it up? At the end of the day, I followed that rabbit hole. I went down that. At the very least, we’re having fun. We’re enjoying life. When we die and also it’s like, “Fooled you. None of this is true.” At the end of the day, it was still fun. We thought we were in control of our existence, whether we are or not. We feel we’re creating and we’re coming up with proof to prove to ourselves that we are. We’re having a fun time doing it and finding others who want to play in that. I don’t see a downside, other than we might be crazy.
Connects Us: What really matters is that you’re finding a life that you can believe in.
What really matters is that you’re finding a life that you can believe in. At the end of the day, that’s what really matters. If you were living a life that you didn’t believe in, you will be living a lie. That is unsatisfying in the worst way. Just as long as you are satisfied with your life, no one else is going to walk in your shoes. As long as you are happy with your existence and what you’ve done, I don’t think you have to answer anybody. That’s the ultimate human freedom right there.
I love that you said that because that is really what drove me on this whole trajectory, to get total sovereignty and authority over my own existence. What I find is the people who are most willing to play in these spaces of synchronicities and superpower and everywhere else and just the creative element, are the ones who are willing to say exactly what you’ve just said, which is that’s enough. It’s enough that I believe it. The ones, in my opinion, who are seeking and seeking, and seeking and feel as though they’re at the mercy of some element that’s just outside of their reach are the ones who that’s not enough for them. They want the proof. They need that external proof. When I released the need to have external proof, everything shifted. Ironically, then the external proof showed up. It was like, “That’s what happened.”
When you stop looking for your keys, that’s when you go and sit on them on the couch. You need to be unafraid and you don’t need validation. I’ll put it this way, if you don’t’ need validation, you don’t need validation. Some people do need validation. But everybody’s different. That’s okay. That’s what’s amazing about the world. It’s okay to be different. You don’t need someone to tell you that you are good. You just need to know that you’re good. You need to know that you are who you are. Like you said, it’s a bag of rocks? Once you let it go, things get easier. Things seem to fall into place.
Ironically, people do show up and tell you that you’re good. But by then, you don’t care. It sounds nice. You’re like, “That’s awesome. You want to play with me? Very cool.” It doesn’t define who you are. Whether they choose to play with you or not, it doesn’t define you. I had to go through some really intense gut level searching in starting this whole Super Power Experts adventure. A couple of times along the way I had to go, “If nobody else wants to play in my sandbox, am I still going to create it?” I was like, “Yes.” I had to get to that yes. Until I was able to hear that very clearly for myself, everything was in flux and it was happening and it was going. There was all these concerns, “What are people going to think and can we really say that?” Every step along the way was just another degree of crazy. Ultimately, I’m doing this for very self-serving purposes. That’s why people want to play because it’s free.
It’s true because people are attracted to confidence. The funny thing about that is, confident people don’t need your attraction. I love little snippets of quotes and things like that. One great quote that I heard recently was, “Confidence is not, they will like me. Confidence is, I will be okay if they don’t.” If you walk into a room, confidence is going, “If no one likes me, it’s going to be okay. I’m going to be fine when I leave this room.” For whatever reason, people gravitate towards that person because they don’t care. At the end of the day, you’re not affected. In my opinion, it’s probably because you’re a solid. You’re a rock. You’re not fluctuating. You’re not trying to appease. You are who you are. That offers a certain bit of stability. People dig that. People dig people that know who they are and are confident and are comfortable in their own shoes. Again, confident people don’t need your reassurance, yet you still admire them for their confidence.
My bias is that even though everybody’s different and all these other things, I think that ultimately some aspect of it is constantly seeking that connection to ourselves. It shows up differently for everybody, but I feel that’s what has us in fear or doubt or seeking, or any of those things. I see it over and over and over again. People only react in what we would consider maybe negative or fearful ways, whether it would be through anger, whatever the myriad of reactions might be. Typically, if you dig down deep enough, it’s the fear of that non-connection, which some people equate to survival things, like fear of death, which again is a symbol of non-connection, or lack of love. It appears in many different ways. The kernel of fear is the same over and over again. When you are clear in who you are, in that connection to self, even death isn’t terrifying. There’s no fear of lack of survival because you know you’re going to be fine regardless.
I’ve said to many clients, “Here’s the thing, at the end of the day, even death isn’t that big of a deal.” When you start to rid yourself of all the ways that fear likes to show up, it’s a very powerful existence.
Connects Us: I think there’s a certain element inside of us that wants to belong.
The cool part about death is once it happens to you, you’re not even going to care. That’s like the fear of being asleep. Once you get there, you’re not going to be worried about it. It’s already over. Going back to what you said about being connected, I think that we are an animal. We’re part of this planet. We’re social creatures. By design, we are meant to be part of a social group. I think there’s a certain element inside of us that wants to belong. As people, we have a little bit of that. We want to be part of a group mentality. There are certain animal elements that we could validate and we can hold to, but certain things, we can evolve past. We can transcend those certain things that we know are part of us. We have animal instincts all the time but I can’t drop my drawers and drop a trowel on the subway. I can’t do that. You can transcend the need to belong. It feels nice and good.
At the end of the day, you can go, “Is this really necessary?” There are certain mental health things that might require some connection, family and significant others, and children. At the end of the day, you’re in control of your own brain, you have gotten the self-awareness point to where you’re aware that you’re a social creature and that your mind is forcing you to believe these certain things. Just like sexual attraction is just evolution’s way of trying to propagate your DNA. You realize that and you’re like, “I am actually physically attracted to this person, but it’s also my gonads trying to make me make more people.”
You’re obviously a seeker and you gravitate toward resources. What are some of your favorites? You’ve mentioned a few thinkers. Is there anything currently that you’re reading? What are you into?
I haven’t really had too much time for reading. I know that I do enjoy Stephen Covey. It’s something I’ve always gone back to, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. That’s something that works well in both personal relationships and business about how to approach situations. I always dig Stephen Covey. There’s another podcast that I really, really enjoy. It’s a male lifestyle improvement podcast called The Art of Charm. I listened to those guys for years. They are really good and they help you deconstruct social situations. They help you become a higher quality person. It started off as a dating-type podcast, but it evolved into this. If you become a better person, you become a better candidate and you become more attractive just by expanding your mind and just by being a valuable person. Not just by learning a few tricks here and there about what kind of sweater to wear or how to peacock with your top hat. You actually learn things. The Art of Charm is something that I listen to occasionally.
I’ve been getting a little more political podcasts lately. There’s one I’ve been listening to called Pod Save America, which is a newer one. It’s only been on the air for maybe a couple of months. They talk about the political climate. Basically, it’s critical thinking and talking about just facts and sources, accountability. I’m a huge comic book nerd. I read comic books. I’m a big DC nerd. Anybody that knows me knows that I’m a huge, huge Batman fan. He does delve into his own certain limits of human capabilities and things like that.
What I like is the diversity. What’s so fascinating about that is part of the vision or guidance that I downloaded, accessed, created, however you want to look at it, was the idea that bringing everybody into the same conversation, breaking down the walls in terms of the genres and the archetypal tribes. We’re pretty clear that we get to create what comes next, how do we want to do that? Pulling from a number of different arenas and genres. What’s ironic is, I remember in college, I had so much trouble deciding on a major. I eventually chose psychology because I like digging around people’s brains. I ended up coming out of it because my professors kept saying, “This is not the psychological perspective that you’re taking with this.” I’m like, “Why would I want to take the psychological perspective? There are a million perspectives. Why can’t I bring in sociology and economics?” They were like, “Because this is psychology, and there’s a psychological perspective.”
It never fit in my brain. What I was able to find was an interdisciplinary degree so that I could pick a topic but look at it from a variety of perspectives. I’ve been doing this my whole existence, where it’s like, “Have you thought about this?” I like the idea that you have politics and self-help, new thought arena, and comic books, which brings it all together.
There’s something to be said for stories. I love a good story. A good story is believable. It’s something that is not so far-fetched that it couldn’t actually happen. You need to have these avenues of fiction. But you also need to be paying attention to what’s really happening. Also, you need to pay attention to yourself. Like you said, it’s just a variety of ways to look at things. Is this economically motivated? Is this personally motivated? Is this politically motivated? Is this just some story that someone just made up and it’s all a lie? You absolutely have to look at everything from every angle.
Let’s take a movie, for example. Everybody loves movies. You can always connect people to in movies. Movies are this weird combination of fiction, but sometimes they’re not fiction. Sometimes, they’re based on reality. They’re all trying to make money so they’re economic, but they’re also sometimes sending a political message. Sometimes, they’re sending a social message. It’s this single thing that can be looked at from any angle. If you try and analyze something just from one corner, you’re never going to get the entire experience. You’re never going to get the whole story. You need to look at things from different angles.
That’s such a key point of view for the current political environment. If we wanted to be conspiracy theorists, there is benefit to keeping people segmented out. This links back to something else we were talking about when the whole Women’s March and everything else was going on. I talked to a number of people and people know where I stood. I’m not interested in marching, but why am I not? Because obviously I love social change. I love everything about any advancement, but it didn’t feel like advancement to me. I’m really sat and puzzled through. Why would this not feel advancing? People are joining together in a common voice, that’s good. I’m all for that. We have evidence in our history of times when people joined together in a common voice and created real change in the world.
Justin and I really sat with it. I was like, “What is it about this that doesn’t fit for me?” I brought up the civil rights thing. During the civil rights thing, there were actual laws on the books that were damaging. The civil rights movement changed those. That was the challenge I was having. Wait, but are we currently being harmed? No, it’s in reaction to some fear of what may occur in the future. What do I know to be true? I know that the only way to create true change is to create an environment where the anti-thesis of what you want to create isn’t even possible. By saying that we’re bending together in fear something that may occur in the future, in my opinion, actually creates the environment that says it’s possible. What if we say it’s not even possible?
Like a self-fulfilling prophecy almost.
I was hugely involved in diversity training and that thing in college and in grad school, and then obviously the counterintel arena of how national security is working, and all this stuff. Over time, the only consistency I’ve seen is that the very thing that we reel against always persists. One of our newest experts, Dr. Kim Potter talks a lot about what you resist persists. It’s a pretty natural law, if you will. It’s like the anti-cancer charities and foundations. We’re trying to find a cure for cancer. However, at what point in time is giving energy to that really perpetuating it, as opposed to making advancements in its demise? I don’t have the answer, but I do think there’s something to what you’re giving attention to. Saying, “We’re going to lose our rights as women,” but what if nobody can take those away?
It’s like if I say to you, “Don’t think about a hippopotamus.” You’re going to think of a hippopotamus. It’s drawing attention to it by saying, “Don’t draw attention to it.” It automatically draws attention to it.
That’s like parenting 101. You don’t say, “Don’t do that thing,” instead you find the alternate, although I don’t employ that technique much to my own chagrin. I think there’s something to it. This came out for me when I had my all whole platform around rape and Women’s rights and personal power, and all these things. It finally dawned on me that the way that truly shifted for me was exactly what we’ve been talking about, which was when I no longer needed to identify as being somebody who had lost personal power and was in the process of regaining it. I simply made the statement and had a level of awareness that I had it all along.
Connects Us: You need to be able to let go. You need to be able to move on.
You need to be able to let go. You need to be able to move on. Those are the ways that you do grow. Those are the ways that you do get to that next level. It’s not always by addressing it head on. Sometimes, a problem is just a bag of rocks you’re carrying around. Sometimes, you just got to drop it. There are certain things that you can definitely apply that to. Some things are definitely worth marching for, if you want to go back the Women’s March and civil rights. Civil rights; people are obviously getting fire-hosed. That was damaging. In this day and age, it’s not quite that serious. I still think there are some things going on in our society that are less than ideal. We’re never going to be perfect but we still need to strive towards getting ourselves better and in bettering our society and respecting each other.
Going back to the Women’s rights movement, for me, the whole resist thing just seems not really focused. It’s where we’re at right now. There’s so much going on that nobody has got an attention span long enough to just come up with a clear message. Years ago, they had the Occupy movement which had a lot of feeling and energy behind it, but there was no clear path or goal. Until we actually are concise in what they’re trying to accomplish, just as long as you’re clear about where you want to be, that’s how you get there. If you are going in a road trip with no destination, how do you know when you arrive?
There’s a direct connection between clarity of vision and passion or circumstances that demand clarity of vision. The times when people get most mobilized are the most desperate of times. The disorganization is a testament to, the pressure is not high enough, if you will. Some of us only take action when the pot’s really boiling.
Let’s be honest to ourselves. Majority of people in America, we’re not starving, we’re not being beaten in the streets. We’re not having our families separated. This is not the Great Depression. Things right now are offensive and inconvenient. They are not World War II-style concentration camps. This is not African Civil Wars. People will start getting serious when serious things start happening. To quote Louis C.K., an awesome comedian, basically saying, “Holy shit, they’re cutting up people’s heads today.” That’s when things get serious. When you’re actually not only threatened by a way of life but by life, that’s when it gets serious. Right now, it seems just a lot of inconvenience and smoke and mirrors. It’s just so convoluted. It’s just so unfocused. It’s hard to get behind anything.
Going back to the very beginning of our conversation, what I feel like I do really well is I connect to people. I connect to people on all sides. I come in contact with all different kinds of people. We all have something in common. We all have common threads that we share. That’s how you overcome these things, is by not focusing what divides us, because again, by resisting, what divides us they will persist. But by focusing on what connects us, we all breathe the same air. We all have parents. We all need food and water to survive. We all walk in the same planet. These are things that we share and we should focus on those, not so much on what divides us.
I agree, 100%. That is the key. Justin and I have read The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. He talks about a lot of this stuff in there. We don’t really have huge problems. Everybody’s got this amount of fucks to give in their lifetime. Where are you choosing to give those? We’ve evolved to the point where the saber-toothed tiger isn’t coming to kill us every five minutes. Now, what do we do? We create things to be concerned about.
On that same note, we were talking about evolutionary terms and that’s how I view some certain aspects of humanity. We were evolutionary molded to focus on the negative because the negative is what kept us alive. You could stare at a flower and gaze into its beauty, but then you’re not going to see the tiger behind you that’s getting ready to eat you. We’re not designed to focus on beauty. We see beauty, but it’s passing. We focus on disease and famine, the food chain, and what’s going to eat me, how am I going to survive winter? We are pre-conditioned to focus on the negative.
Again, a little bit of self-awareness goes a long way. By knowing that that is how people evolve and operate, you can transcend that. You can say people are force-focused on the negative. I don’t have to do that anymore because I am not in the food chain anymore. I can step back a little bit. Don’t get me wrong. There’s something to be said about you need to give some attention to negative things. When you’re crossing the street, you should definitely look both ways because that could definitely go the wrong way. You can’t just be negative all the time. You got to step back and you got to be positive because we have the ability to do that now.
I know people are going to want to find you. Do you want to send them to Hemingway’s? Connect with us on HemingwaysTavern.com. We’d love you to go to our Facebook page and like us and see what we’re about. You can see what we do in the restaurant. There’ll be some pictures of the establishment and the food and the people. That’s pretty much it, Hemingway’s Tavern on Facebook or Hemingway’s Tavern online.
Thank you so much for joining us. I’m really excited and I’m hoping that you’ll come back and talk with us again sometime. Jimmy, thank you so much. It is so much fun reconnecting with you.
Tonya, I look forward to doing it again and again. I really thank you for having me on here.
To all of you out there, as always, we appreciate your loyalty. Until next time, go out, uncover your superpowers and change the world. Take care, everyone.
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