00:00:00:00 - 00:00:26:20
Emily Orton
We were feeling a little stuck, a little trapped as a family in the life that we were living and the the work we were doing and and where we were just we wanted to have a little more control in our lives. And we just felt like it wasn't possible. And we realized that a lot of that was coming from the excuses that we were making about why we could not get unstuck.
00:00:26:22 - 00:00:34:08
Emily Orton
So today we're going to talk about excuses. Welcome to the What Could Go Right podcast. My name is Emily Orton.
00:00:34:09 - 00:00:35:15
Erik Orton
I'm Erik Orton, and.
00:00:35:15 - 00:00:48:02
Emily Orton
On this podcast we talk about personal development and family connections and raising adult kids. That's where we are in life. We don't have all the answers, but we are on the hunt.
00:00:48:03 - 00:00:55:11
Erik Orton
We got five kids. Most of them are adults. And so we're we're just happy to be a part of this conversation about the stage of life.
00:00:55:13 - 00:01:25:21
Emily Orton
And today, I want to bring us back a few years, because March is the month, five years ago that our book came out. It's called Seven at Sea. Why a New York City Family Cast Off Convention for a Life Changing Year on a Sailboat. And we learned a lot of things on this experience that have become part of our practice life philosophy and what we teach or speak about.
00:01:25:21 - 00:01:45:12
Emily Orton
And and so today we want to talk about some of those excuses that were keeping us stuck when we were in that little like 800 square foot apartment with our five young kids. And you were in a job that you didn't like and maybe you want to tell about that. I want to speak for you.
00:01:45:12 - 00:01:53:23
Erik Orton
Well, I think, you know, I don't want to misrepresent it because I think there are lots of things that we wanted to change about our lives, but we were also very happy.
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Emily Orton
Yeah. I think it's important to say, like because we practiced gratitude and we were in good relationship there.
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Erik Orton
Because it wasn't like this is this is not coming from a place of feeling sorry for ourselves. We weren't.
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Emily Orton
Oliver Twist.
00:02:06:14 - 00:02:31:08
Erik Orton
We we had a comfortable place to live. We had plenty of food to eat. We had friends, We had a big park across the street. We we loved our neighborhood a lot of things about our neighborhood. And, you know, we were living in New York City. And so there are obviously some drawbacks, but also some really huge bonuses, some and and we loved our snug lives in our little apartment.
00:02:31:10 - 00:02:41:10
Erik Orton
And, you know, we didn't love everything about it. But yeah, this wasn't coming from a place of desperation or a desire to just escape from everything.
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Emily Orton
Yeah, we weren't running from. We were running to.
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Erik Orton
Yeah, yeah. And I think that's an important distinction.
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Emily Orton
Yeah.
00:02:48:08 - 00:03:10:20
Erik Orton
And so, so just that. And I had a job that was fine. You know, there was, there were what I'll sort of joke about some, some soul sucking aspects of it where it just wasn't terribly fulfilling, but it wasn't awful, you know, it was a perfectly fine job and it paid our bills and we you know, and I got to see my family and we had, you know, so it was it was a good life.
00:03:10:22 - 00:03:34:16
Erik Orton
It was a good life. What I think is the the crux of it is that it wasn't our best life. And and there was room to grow. There was room to room to level up. And so what is the adage? Good is the enemy of best. Yeah, and we're still on our way there. But does that speak to what you're asking?
00:03:34:17 - 00:03:57:08
Emily Orton
Yeah, I think that we were a happy family, but almost daily, multiple times a week, you would call and tell me how much you did not like your job and you wanted to get out of there and we just saw our kids were growing up and they were going to move out. And there were we just felt like maybe there was more for us and we were searching around for like, What is that?
00:03:57:08 - 00:04:28:05
Emily Orton
Like, what is this, this discontent? At the same time as we felt grateful for so many good things that were happening, we had this discontent. Anyway, we're talking about excuses. And so we realized that we had a bunch of excuses and it came up because Eric had this idea for the more that he wanted in our life or the different the change that he was hoping to make.
00:04:28:05 - 00:04:52:23
Emily Orton
And it all centered around this idea of living on a sailboat. I won't go into all the the details. Obviously, we wrote a whole book about it called Seven at Sea and and the Emotional Journey and the Physical Journey for our family to make it to that point because we had no experience on boats and we had to start from scratch to learn how to do it.
00:04:52:23 - 00:05:26:08
Emily Orton
And and we it was it was a financial challenge to make those things happen. So then Eric had this idea of like, I would love to live on a sailboat for a year. And we realized as soon as we have that idea, it felt very exciting. Like, wouldn't that be amazing? Right? But that we came up with immediately, like right up alongside it sprang up all these excuses for not doing it.
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Emily Orton
And you can, you can list some of them. Yeah, go for it.
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Erik Orton
I think one of them was obviously we didn't know how to sail.
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Emily Orton
Yeah, well.
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Erik Orton
You know, I didn't know anything about boats in a lot of ways. Still don't didn't grow up around, you know, I thought, you know, you had to grow up around boats to, like, have permission to get on one or so.
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Emily Orton
Yeah, we didn't have permission for sure.
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Erik Orton
We didn't. Nobody had given us permission to get on a boat. So there was that obstacle.
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Emily Orton
We hadn't been invited.
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Erik Orton
We also didn't know how we would pay for boating, sailing lessons or buying a boat, let alone a trip that lasted a year. We didn't know how to pay for it. So there's that excuse.
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Emily Orton
Yeah. So we probably shouldn't do it.
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Erik Orton
Being too poor.
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Emily Orton
We shouldn't look into.
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Erik Orton
It. Yeah, probably should look. And the other is we have five kids. Five kids between the ages of 6 to 16.
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Emily Orton
I mean, at the time we were had the idea we had five kids between the ages of two and 12.
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Erik Orton
Okay. Yeah. Even better. Even better.
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Emily Orton
Because our own weight, our baby, our baby had Down's syndrome. Our baby was having seizures. Like, we can't go anywhere. And what about our friends like that? We have these friends, we have this community. These people care about us and we're just going to, like, leave and new people will come in and then we won't have friends anymore.
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Erik Orton
All that. And, you know, I also knew that if we ever did something like this, it would mean financial ruin, because who hires a guy? You know, like if we if we even if we made it out alive, who we come back, who hires a guy who just took off a year to go sell with his family? Clearly he's irresponsible and not clear thinking.
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Emily Orton
Yeah, what if we did get in an accident and something happened to any of us? Like, how would we handle that? Where are the doctors? So are you just out there on the ocean?
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Erik Orton
How do you get medical insurance? Or do they even do they even have medicine out there who.
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Emily Orton
Were like, And where are we going to buy food? And just we anyway, we probably shouldn't even think about this.
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Erik Orton
Yeah, let's this was a dumb idea.
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Emily Orton
Let's just let's just go back to our regular life.
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Erik Orton
Whatever. Okay. So we're obviously doing a little bit of tongue in cheek here. So have any of these excuses ever crept up for you in your mind when you've thought of or imagined something that was more or I'll just say, different from what you're doing now, Do some of these obstacles or excuses just come to mind easily, because they sure did for us.
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Emily Orton
Yeah. We don't have the money, we don't have the time, we don't have the experience. We're not in the right life situation or this kid has a really good group of friends or, you know, this kid. This kid has the therapists, right? You know, that we need right now. And you just don't want to mess up a good thing.
00:08:28:02 - 00:08:32:19
Erik Orton
Okay, So. So what happened, Emily? We had all these excuses.
00:08:32:21 - 00:08:38:23
Emily Orton
we did this practice, and you have to be so brave to do this.
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Erik Orton
Where did we come across this?
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Emily Orton
We made it.
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Erik Orton
Up. We made it up. We're the fourth grade.
00:08:42:15 - 00:09:01:16
Emily Orton
We did this. You know, if you've ever seen Dan in real life, this is one of our favorite quotes. The daughter says, I'm in the fourth grade. I can make things up. And you can make things up, too. And this is what we made up for ourselves. We did this little practice. I think you'll also find this if you have ever heard of Byron Katie, she does something similar.
00:09:01:18 - 00:09:30:22
Emily Orton
She calls the work. But this We didn't know about her and we just did this. We created a whole list of excuses, like all the obstacles, all the reasons we are like that we thought meant we cannot go. We cannot entertain an idea like this because of this whole list of excuses. And then we took every single one of those excuses and rewrote them as a reason to go on this trip.
00:09:31:00 - 00:09:39:22
Emily Orton
So, for example, you might say, Well, we have five kids. We can't go on a trip like this. And we said, what would be turning it into a reason?
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Erik Orton
Because we have five kids. We must go on this trip.
00:09:44:04 - 00:09:59:01
Emily Orton
Yeah, exactly. We must go on this trip. And then we had reasons like, this is going to bond us as a family. And this is the special time that we have together before they leave home. And we started justifying our wants to ourself, but we don't have to get too deep into that.
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Erik Orton
But maybe it should be because we have five kids. We must go on this trip because DOT and you can add all those reasons because because this is going to be so why is this going to be great for them? Why is this going to be great for us and get into that space of we need to do this because and just do the exact opposite thinking like we can't afford this.
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Erik Orton
You know, we must go on this trip because in the process, because in the process we will learn the financial skills or the financial mindset that will change our lives forever.
00:10:31:21 - 00:10:54:12
Emily Orton
And yeah, will because we need to figure out those skills for how to afford things. Or I think one of the ones that is probably like really easy to understand, for example, is like, we cannot go on this trip because we have a child with special needs them. Instead, we must go on this trip because we have a child with special needs, because this is going to help her have concrete experiences in the world.
00:10:54:12 - 00:11:34:18
Emily Orton
And that's how she learns. Like it's especially going to be good for her to go out and see and touch the world and meet the people in it. And so that's kind of how how it works. I might be like, I can't I can't live on a sailboat because I have five kids and then you might rewrite it as I want to live on a sailboat because I have five kids, you know, whatever it is, we're just using our sailboat examples because we are thinking about the things that we learned as we prepared our minds and our hearts and our finances and our, you know, our.
00:11:34:18 - 00:11:35:09
Erik Orton
Friendships.
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Emily Orton
Our friendships and just like our packing lists and everything, our our home, everything to to be able to actually do something like that. And this is this month is the five year anniversary of our memoir about that experience coming out. So we're just kind of reviewing some of the things that the the ways of thinking or the little tools for handling obstacles that helped us, you know, get out on the boat and transform as a family.
00:12:06:00 - 00:12:13:14
Emily Orton
If you're watching the YouTube version of this, Eric is holding up a copy of the book with our family, all in a tiny boat learning how to sail.
00:12:13:16 - 00:12:16:02
Erik Orton
When they were little. This is when we started learning how to see.
00:12:16:05 - 00:12:19:02
Emily Orton
That orange life versus.
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Erik Orton
Okay, But.
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Emily Orton
This has been a big one and it really is. Every time I start to feel some resistance to something and I start to tell myself why I can't do something, I remember this practice of turning an excuse not to into a reason to do it, and I still get to choose, you know, how I'm going to act and and what decisions I'm going to make that just help loosen up some knots in my brain to make room for these good things to flow into my life.
00:12:55:07 - 00:13:25:14
Emily Orton
As you rewrite your excuses into reasons, this is a perfect time to use the eponymous podcast title question What could go right? So if you're if you're coming up against some obstacles, we would definitely recommend you try this. It's fine if you just work it out in your mind or say it out loud to the people you're doing life with, but it's super powerful to write them down.
00:13:25:16 - 00:13:27:09
Erik Orton
Is it okay if I pivot to sailing?
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Emily Orton
yeah, Well, we're talking about sailing like that, asking, like turning those excuses into reasons and and asking what could go right and filling out that list like the the number of reasons why we should go just got so huge. We were like, we cannot afford to miss this window of opportunity. We have to figure out how to make it work.
00:13:50:04 - 00:14:00:12
Emily Orton
And we did. And Seven at Sea tells about that journey. That's why it's called Why a New York City Family castoff Convention.
00:14:00:14 - 00:14:01:23
Erik Orton
As opposed to how.
00:14:02:02 - 00:14:10:07
Emily Orton
This is not a how to book. This is like why it was worth the effort to us to overcome all those obstacles, mostly in our minds.
00:14:10:09 - 00:14:25:14
Erik Orton
So I'm not trying to strongarm anybody or when I say this or throw anybody under the bus, but I talk to a lot of people about going sailing on these trips that we're offering this year, and it's always a delight every time. Every conversation is a delight whether people decide to go or not.
00:14:25:15 - 00:14:37:05
Emily Orton
And yeah, if you're new to the podcast, one of the things that we offer now is that we take other people sailing and try out living on a sailboat, not for a whole year, but for a week.
00:14:37:07 - 00:14:56:02
Erik Orton
Can go out for a week. It can be a group of people that you put together or you can book a cabin and go out with other like minded people that want to try living on the water and so when I talk with people, a lot of times they might say, I can't afford it totally fine, or I can't go because I get seasick, totally fine.
00:14:56:04 - 00:15:46:07
Erik Orton
I can't go because I have high school age kids and they're busy with sports and other things. I can't go because I have little kids and I can't find babysitting or I can't go because I have, you know, a frail parent that we're caring for. And these are all very legitimate reasons to not do something. I'm not trying to say that every now and then somebody will say, we want to figure out how to afford this or I want to give my high school kids an opportunity to have some independence and grow into an experience where we're not we're not we may not be around or kind of thinking back to a previous episode with
00:15:46:07 - 00:16:17:05
Erik Orton
the kill packs, where they left on a long trip and they left their young kids at home and how how that was so good for them and their relationships with extended family. And so I would just invite you to consider whether it's going sailing or anything else that you might want to do. You just think about all your reasons why you'll tell yourself you can't, and then just consider play a game and say, What if I just flipped this and said, You know, because I get seasick, I need to go sailing.
00:16:17:07 - 00:16:23:01
Erik Orton
Not because you want to get seasick, but it gives you a chance to face it and decide whether it's.
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Emily Orton
As big of a problem as you think it is.
00:16:25:01 - 00:16:42:10
Erik Orton
Is maybe it's not as bad as you think it is, or you want to learn how to overcome it. Because if you can overcome that, then what else is possible in your life or what other opportunities open up? Or I'm caring for an aging parent. And the reason I need to go is because if I don't, I'll burn out and I'll start to resent them and, you know, I'm making stuff up.
00:16:42:11 - 00:17:00:20
Emily Orton
You know, it's true, though. And I remember when when Eric first talked about learning how to sail, I had a deep fear of deep water. And I did. I was really scared about that. The concept of even getting on to a boat in the water. And he said, Well, that's like the perfect reason to learn how to sail, because then you never have to get in the water.
00:17:00:20 - 00:17:27:23
Emily Orton
You can always stay in the boat and you'll feel comfortable, you'll know what you're doing. And I eventually did push into that fear of deep water. And now I scuba and snorkel and and sometimes attempt surfing and things like that. And I love it. And I just I can't believe all the years that I went not enjoying like 70% of the planet because I was afraid of deep water.
00:17:28:01 - 00:18:01:19
Emily Orton
And I was really grateful that you kind of nudged me to to take a little step forward. But it is it is true. If it's something that you don't want to do, that's easy. Just be like, I just don't want to do that. If you're saying to yourself, I can't do that. And I like this little bit of challenge to say what might be the reasons to figure it out and and not just and not even just about coming sailing with us, which is such a great experience and so, so fun and kind of mind expanding and just rejuvenating for everybody who comes.
00:18:01:19 - 00:18:19:19
Emily Orton
But for whatever it is that you're telling yourself, I can't do that. That indicates that maybe you want to. And so might be helpful if you say, like, I should do this because of these reasons and what could go right. Yeah, yeah.
00:18:19:19 - 00:18:37:02
Erik Orton
So if you want if you do want if you want to go sailing, let's talk hit the link in the shownotes. It's also our website Forward slash sailing 2020 for happy to look at a private trip for you and a small group or see if booking a cabin is a good fit for you. Anything else before we wrap up?
00:18:37:02 - 00:19:00:08
Emily Orton
Yeah. I just want to tell a really short story. This is with regard to excuses and reasons and exactly what you were saying is that we had a couple that wanted to come sailing, but they were the full time caregivers for an aging parent, and they flipped that into a reason, exactly like Eric said. And he said, We are going to get burned out.
00:19:00:08 - 00:19:33:16
Emily Orton
And they they came out on that trip and it allowed them to completely re fresh and reset like reset their marriage. And they not only did they get go back into that care situation refreshed and full of energy to give love to that to their their aging parents. But they also had that time to reimagine like the next 15 to 20 years for them as they moved out of the workforce and into retirement.
00:19:33:16 - 00:19:53:04
Emily Orton
And they got very clear on their goals and they felt so excited about the future when they went back because they they stepped out of the like the little the pressure routine they were in and and recharged themselves. And yeah, it was it was really awesome for them.
00:19:53:06 - 00:19:56:01
Erik Orton
So food for thought. Thanks for listening.
00:19:56:03 - 00:19:58:19
Emily Orton
What could go right?
