The reason why people get overwhelmed is they are 1,000 steps ahead of themselves. To overcome overwhelm, take a deep breath in, come back to the present, and ask yourself, “What’s my next step?” Penny Zenker’s guest for this episode is Robert Riopel, an international bestselling author, app designer, entrepreneur, and trainer. Robert shares how knowing himself better helped him conquer stressful situations. Overcome overwhelm. Tune in to this episode to learn how. 

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How To Overcome Overwhelm With Robert Riopel 

I am excited to talk to you about an important topic. We are going to talk about overwhelm. Not just after the pandemic, I don’t know that we were at the end of it, but it is a perfect topic for any time because with life’s fast-paced, digital, emotional, and all of these different things that are coming at us at the same time demanding our attention. It’s something that we need to talk about and get a hold of. Robert Riopel is with me. Who is that guy? He is the master and he is going to share with us some of his experience. 

He is an international bestselling author, app designer, entrepreneur, and trainer who spent years traveling around the world and sharing his passions. He also shares the stage with many top trainers and thought leaders. He’s on his journey that he draws from his humble beginnings to his financial freedom at the age of 32. We’re going to know more about these stories and how he’s overcome the idea of overwhelm and how you can as well.  

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Robert, welcome to the show. 

Thanks, Penny. I am absolutely feeling blessed to be here to have some fun with you and your audience. 

I am excited for it. I know everybody is like, “Robert was financially free at the age of 32. What does this guy have to say about overwhelm?” Tell us about that. 

I don’t know if anybody else would agree with this, but to me, financial stress has got to be one of the worst stresses out there. You talk about getting into overwhelm. Before I became financially free, I was deep in debt, and that was where the overwhelm was coming. My wife and I were the youngest of our families. We’re both born into families who were not entrepreneurs. You work hard. Find a job that’s going to be secure whether you like it or not. The one that pays you the most and the one that is most secure. You got that even if you hate the job. You do it to take care of your family. That was what we both grew up. Entering the workforce, that’s what I did. I’m trying to find the best job that can pay me the most and be the most secure.  

By the time I’m 21, I’m laid off from three different jobs. Especially the last one, I thought I was going to be with them for 40 years. They have factories all over North America. I found myself being a general manager. Imagine my shock when I walk into the office on a Monday, after having a week off, and the general manager called me in his office and says, “I am letting you know we’re shutting the factory down. You were laid off as of last Friday.” I’m like, “You could not have told me that before I went on a holiday?” He was like, “We did not know.”  

You create opportunities by treating everybody like gold. Click To Tweet

You did not want to know before you went on holiday anyway. 

That is very true but I might have spent a little less money. You are talking about instant overwhelm, I got to now go home and say to my wife, “I am home because I do not have a job anymore.” Overwhelm played a big part of my life, especially young. I feel blessed that I learned the lesson that if I wanted to have success, I had to take control of it. Out of necessity, because before I lived here in Alberta, when our oil prices are up in the world, we bull. We have lots of work. Everybody is making money and happy. When oil prices are down, we go through an oil bust. I look back now at hindsight being 20/20. It goes in almost like eight-year cycles. I love a bumper sticker I saw on a back of a truck once. It said, “God, please let there be one more oil boom. I promise not to piss it away this time.” 

When times are good, we get into that rhythm. We were in an oil bust and I cannot find a job. Out of necessity, I started delivering pizzas. Luckily, my parents taught me you do whatever it takes to support your family. I am newly married. I started delivering pizzas for Domino’s Pizza. I’m able to go on to become a manager. Why? My franchisee sold the store I was working in. We have two in a city an hour and a half away. I was afraid I was going to lose my job if the new owner came in. I’m like, “What can I do? You have two stores. Do you need a manager?” I didn’t even know if I wanted to be a manager, but to me, that was the path of security. 

Two weeks later, I started managing. My wife becomes my assistant manager. We start working open to close seven days a week. Imagine our surprise when I’m now qualified to be a franchisee. We don’t have money, but I’m qualified. All of a sudden, our franchisee says, “I’m tired of Domino’s Pizza. I’m selling the two stores.” Instantly the first people that are fired are the managers when new owners come in. We came up with the crazy idea. We were going to buy the store we’re working in. We did not have any money, but one thing that served me well is I have passion. Passion is my favorite word in the whole world. We made a lot of mistakes over a 3- to 4-month period of learning. Can we buy a business with no money of our own? We ended up buying both of the stores. We did it with 100% financing and we became franchisees. It was like, “We have got it made.”  

You own two franchises. You still got to run them.  

With a lot of hard work, we were franchisees for nine years. We went through a lot of ups and downs staffing, stress, having to change over the looks of the stores. The big overwhelm came at around the eight-year mark because we’re not enjoying Domino’s Pizza anymore. We don’t want to do it and we’re going deep in debt. We’re also in $150,000 in debt and not sure what we’re going to do. That’s that financial overwhelm. It was like, “How do we get through this?” That’s when we were introduced to personal development for the first time. I shouldn’t say the first time because my brother-in-law and not to age myself but I remember we’re at home and he goes, “There’s this guy named Tony Robbins. I bought his cassette tapes. You should listen to them.” I’m like, “I’m not listening to cassette tapes whoever this guy is.”  

 

You use the word necessity a couple of times. You are probably using it intentionally, but I want to challenge you on that because you were being in each of these cases. There was a pressure to find security and we’re all driven to find security, but in that same context, people make a choice. You were still proactive. Even though there was a necessity, you saw an opportunity. I want to make sure that people who are reading are clear that you were looking for opportunities to provide that security. They didn’t fall in your lap. They were not like, “We all have necessities.” I’m a stickler with words. You sought after it and you also didn’t accept. I know you’ve got a lot more to the story, but you could have accepted defeat. You were fired from that job. You could have welled up in a ball and sat there. That’s a choice and it’s also a choice to say, “I’m going to whatever I can.” 

I want to point out and ask you some motivating factors around that because I know somebody who was in a situation. They had a good job as a consultant. They got laid off and they refused to go to work at a Starbucks, Wegmans, a pizza delivery, or anything that could provide the day-to-day expenses and cover those. He lost his apartment, chose to live in his car, and it went downhill from there. He broke it into depression. Before we go on with your story, I want to understand a little bit about those early days because the stronger you get in it, the better you get at it. What helped you to make that decision to take action versus inaction?  

Penny, hindsight being 20/20, I clearly see it now. Not many of the people that I do interviews with catch that. They bring it back to that. I am so happy I did because now I see it was choices, but back then, it felt like a necessity. The one thing that made the difference, two words, my wife. Here’s what I mean by that. I’m very blessed that my wife and I met when we were thirteen. We started dating when we were sixteen and that’s when she tackled me to the ground because I wasn’t noticing her. We started dating the next day and then we got married when we were nineteen. 

The reason I say my wife is because in my upbringing, I would have given up. The greatest opportunity could have come my way, but the first little hiccup and bump were tough. One of the gifts that my wife gives me is she’s not willing to let me play smaller than I am. When I was let go from that third job, I wasn’t in a pity party and wallowing in it. She said, “What’s next?” I’m like, “There’s no work. I looked for three months. I’ve been counting. I’ve been putting out resumes.” She goes, “Start doing something.” Because I had delivered pizza before, I started doing that.  

I love that you picked up on the opportunity part too. Why did I become a manager? I was the one busting my butt as a driver and the franchisee saw my value. He knew the worker I was. Had I just been a driver that was afraid to lose the job and said, “Let me be a manager.” It probably would have been a no because he had other people in line. I was taking shifts that nobody else wanted. I created that opportunity. You’re so right on that as well, which is awesome. 

The same thing is with being a franchisee. The backstory of that is the reason we kept going was my wife kept pushing it, “Think bigger. Think outside of the box.” At the time in Canada, there was a company about to take over. It was called a Master Franchise. They were going to be the master franchisees for the whole country. The father and two of the brothers that owned the company all lived in my delivery area. They’d been ordering pizzas from me for over a year. We didn’t know who they were, but we treated every customer like gold. I already had the opportunity because when I said, “We want to be franchisees.” They’re like, “Yes, you are going to be franchisees because they knew who we were.” We had created that by treating everybody like gold. I’m so happy you picked up on that. 

People are out there thinking, “I don’t have a wife like that.” What do you have to say to them? 

Who do you have in your life? We have heard the saying, “Surround yourself with like-minded people.” That’s great but I got an awakening in 2020 from a mentor because I stayed on the stage. “How many of you love being in a room full of like-minded people?” Everybody was like, “Yeah.” That’s what I believed. A new perspective came in. He said, “Don’t surround yourself with like-minded people because if you’re at a bus stop going to the mall with four other people, you’re all like-minded. You wait for the bus that’s going to take you to the mall. Surround yourself with growth-minded people.” Those are the people willing to have those hard conversations. How many other hosts would have stopped me in the mid-sentence and said, “No, let’s go deeper. This is crap.” 

I didn’t say it was crap. I know that I wanted to have a conversation about what’s going on. I knew you weren’t going to get to it, but I wanted to cut to the chase. 

If you don’t have a wife like mine, find the people who are willing to hold you to a higher standard.  

I’m a challenger. I like to challenge people. I love to see new insights for myself and I love people to challenge me growth-minded people. I’m 100% on board with that. We have to surround ourselves with people who have our best interests that want to lift us up, aren’t afraid to challenge us, and push a little. We hire a coach so that they can push us because we want to be our best selves. We want to be better and need support structures in order to do that because our nature is to take the easiest route. That’s the way our brain works. We have to have somebody to kick us in the butt.  

My best coach is the one I hate calling because he makes me the most productive. When I do the call with him, I want it to be as short as possible. I don’t like him, but I love the results because he will not let me get away with anything.  

I wanted to make sure people have that distinction because they don’t have a partner. You can go out. That is also being proactive. Find those people. Maybe they were part of a group. You got connected with the Tony Robbins community and that could surround you with people who were growth-minded. You will find those people who could push you or doing what you want to do, what you wish you could do, and then you find out how to get them to mentor you and to be part of whatever community they’re in so that you can learn from them. 

Also, understand yourself. I know I am a world-class procrastinator. I freely admit that. I design my day in such a way that procrastination cannot play. When I started training, people go, “How did you become a trainer that travels around the world?” I volunteered at 38 events a year to give back because I learned so much, but I’m now 38 times in that energy for days at a time, which doesn’t give me a chance to being that procrastinator. Because I understand myself, I design things to make sure I don’t give myself the space to sabotage.  

Understand yourself to make sure you don’t give yourself the space to sabotage. Click To Tweet

It’s an amazing energy to be in. I’m also a big fan. I want to come to a point where you delivered pizzas because you had delivered pizzas before, and you chose to be a franchisee because you were already in this space. I’m a big believer of doing more with what we have that. Sometimes, it’s by our nature that we delete, distort, and generalize things, so when things are stressful and we delete all the good things that we know about ourselves, focus on the bad things, or we’ll generalize about how this always happens to me or these types of things. I’m a big believer that we already have great skills and knowledge. How can we do more with what we have, what we love, and make more out of it? What’s your take on that? How did that play in you making those decisions that you made? 

That comes right back to the overwhelm. One of the things I have discovered of why people get overwhelmed is, let’s say, you have a goal, something you want to accomplish, or where you think you should be, you’re here. You’ve got that goal in front of you and the reason most people get overwhelmed is because they were not present. They were 1,000 steps ahead of themselves at that goal already or in that situation, and now they’re trying to figure out everything that has to be done to get them there. All of a sudden, they feel the pressure. Can I do it? The self-doubt and their minds start going even more crazy because they were 1,000 steps ahead of them. There’s a quote I love that the journey of 1,000 miles begins with the first step.  

To overcome that overwhelm, I’m teaching audiences all over the world. Take that deep breath in. Come back to being present and ask yourself, “What’s my next step?” Take that step. Check-in with yourself. “How am I doing? Am I okay?” I do not want people to think that it’s easy. It’s a journey. It takes practice like anything. When you come back to present and you do that one step at a time. “Robert, I hate it when I go off track.” 

I’ll look at my example when I was working in the factory. Here I was, my goal was to be the general manager of a factory. I work for these guys for many years. I saw the path so clearly. The general manager, and I still remember his name, Ron Hunting, I’m not happy with him, when he called me in the office and tells me I’m laid off, my life majorly went on a disconnect. I look back now, again hindsight being 20/20, had I not been laid off, I wouldn’t have found Domino’s. Had I not found Domino’s, I wouldn’t have become a franchisee. I wouldn’t have gone $150,000 in debt, which led me to personal development and truly finding my passion, which is to help people and be a trainer to allow me to have the amazing life I have. 

I now look back and I go, “Thank you, Ron, for laying me off.” I can see it with gratitude. It is also switching and looking at the things that maybe you have gone through in the past and instead of bringing them back up and going, “It’s going to happen again and creating that stress and that overwhelm from creating it happening again,” looking back and go, “What did I learn and can I be grateful for that lesson?” How can I use that lesson now that if it happens, not when because we don’t want to attract it to us, what would I do differently? That can take a big load off people’s shoulders as well. 

It brings up for me the expression that when you’re in it, this too shall pass. You can remember that it’s a storm passing through and very often after the storm, the sun comes out, it’s brighter, and the grass is greener. We need to have sometimes that rain and those storms, and then we can appreciate where we are that much more. I find that’s a help to me to keep that in my thoughts that this too shall pass. With that strategy of thinking about what’s next and staying present, those are some helpful tips. It may seem ridiculously simple for somebody who’s in overwhelm, but it doesn’t have to be complex. It is simple. It’s not that easy to implement. I think Jim Rohn said that. 

One of the things to understand too is where your growth-minded individuals come in. I have a friend that we have such an amazing relationship that one of our agreements with each other is that if that were feeling frustrated, pissed off, overwhelmed, whatever it is, we can call them up. They’ll take the call. It’s simply for me to say, “Aaron, here’s what’s going on right now,” and let it out. He doesn’t take it personally or I don’t take it personally if it’s him. It’s about being able to express that energy and let it go because when you’re in it, sometimes we suppress but having someone that you know will hold the space. It’s not about having a bitch session and complaining. It’s about letting that energy out so that now you can move on. I found that has been one of the biggest things that have helped me, especially with what’s going on in the world because I went from traveling 200,000 miles a year around the world doing live events to not traveling at all and having to do a total reinvent.  

Thank goodness I have other businesses, but hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue gone, and I could have gone into the why-me victim for me, which I did. I want your audience to understand. I did for a short amount of time. As soon as I caught it, then two powerful words came up. What’s next? My wife said, “You have been wanting to go virtual for a while. You’re at home now. Let’s do it.” We bought this property to build our own training center in our hometown. Let’s start building it. We broke ground in December 2020 and we’re about two weeks away from me being in my new training facility right off my house so that as things come back to the new normal, my students can now travel to see me instead of me having to travel so much. It has taken where we wanted to be in our life and sped it up by about 3 or 4 years now. Now, I’m going, “You talk about gratitude,” but in the moment, did I think it would work out like this? No, but I had to keep going.  

You mentioned an important word, which is letting go. When one is in overwhelm, how to let go? You mentioned one way, which is having friends or support structures. Maybe it’s a coach or a therapist, whatever. There are lots of different roles that somebody could be. It’s a safe space for you to let it out. Do you have other strategies for letting go when you’re in a place of overwhelm? I think that would be helpful for people.  

I don’t know if I should share this because it’s really silly. I have a button on my computer because that’s normally where the stress will come. I push the button and Elsa comes up singing, “Let it go, let it go. That’s the only part of the song that I know,” because that trigger also allows me to come back to present.  

Do you think that’s funny? We have some stuff in “common.” We do that in our household. My kids, too. We love that. We used to blare that song. For my son, he was going through some difficult times and it was a total releaser. We use that as well, which is really funny. It’s a powerful song. 

If you get it, it really is. I only know those first two lines. That’s all I want to know because that’s what really allows me to move forward. I love that you are such a real person because if your audience is getting this, they’re going to understand it doesn’t matter what people “perceive your successes.” We’re all the same. Our mindset puts people in different positions. When I’m in front of an audience of thousands of students or whatever, one of the first things I love to do is I love to go down off the stage. I’ll be walking through the audience. I’ll find someone who I know is tall and I’ll ask them to help me out. I’ll say, “Can you stand up for a moment?”  

We’ll let the cameras see us we’re on the jumble screens and I’ll go, “Ladies and gentlemen, I want you to notice, I’m short.” I usually get a chuckle from the audience. I said, “Why do I want you to understand that? I’m on stage. It doesn’t mean I’m any better than you or that I have a greater life or that nothing goes wrong. I’m the same as you.” Is it possible I might know things that maybe you don’t know? Sure. Isn’t it also possible you know things that I don’t know? When I set that context at the beginning, it allows me to have an even deeper, real conversation with my audiences because the moment that’s what else will cause overwhelm. 

People look at someone’s success and they go, “I could never do that or I can never get to that space.” I’ve gone through a lot of crap. I share that from the stage all the time, so people understand that they’re not different. I haven’t had a perfect life. For you to get where I’m at, you have to have a perfect life. Your life is perfect. The crap you’re going through is going to make you who you are. The question that I always ask myself is, “Who can I help with the crap I went through?”  

When you share the most difficult times that you’ve had and how you got it, it’s amazing how it connects with people. It’s important to share our crap because it helps people through their crap. We all have it.  

There are people I can’t relate to.  

 

You’re telling me that we’re all full of crap. 

When you talk about overwhelm, one of the things I believe is there are way too many serious people on this planet. Life is too short not to have fun and enjoy it, “Robert, how can I fun? I’m in overwhelm.” 

I was just going to say that. People are like, “How can I have fun or how can I find humor in this time?” What would you say to them?  

One of the things I love to teach people is what I call the four phases of life that people go through. The second phase is called the pamper phase. The pamper phase is the one that most people don’t do, which is why they end up self-sabotaging. In the pamper phase, this is the time where you take care of yourself. Maybe you read a book for twenty minutes because you love reading. You plan a trip or go on a vacation if you can. If you can’t plan a vacation during that time, you get your nails done. If I had hair, I get my hair done. Stuff like that. You pamper yourself or you get a massage. People would say, “Robert, why do you travel all over the world and go on a plane for 15, 16, 17 hours?” 

I wanted to help people around the world that want to learn. The part of it that’s selfish is because as soon as I sit on that plane, that’s my time. I don’t connect to the internet. I read, watch movies because I love movies, eat some good food, and drink some great wine. That’s my pamper time. That’s me taking care of me so that when I have to be on and be there taking care of thousands of people, I can be present for them because I’ve taken care of me. One of the reasons people get overwhelmed is that they forget to take care of themselves. They feel it’s selfish and they don’t deserve it. It comes back to that old saying, “You cannot give what you don’t have.” 

It is a practice. Starting training, I was living my passion too much that I forgot to take care of myself. I ended up having to take a year off because I was burnt out. The year turned into three and a half because I also herniated a disc not taking care of myself on the stage. I went through two back surgeries. Talk about overwhelm then because six weeks in bed, I can’t move. I’m not allowed to get out of bed. You become very humble very quickly in a situation like that.  

We forget, in the moment, the cost of filling every second, the cost of busy, distraction, and hyperfocus even. We need space to regenerate. If you look at any athlete, there’s always an off-season. We don’t have an off-season. We have to build in those mini-breaks, whether it’s within your day or whether it’s taking the weekends. If you don’t do that, then you’re bound to come to a point of burnout. 

People are overwhelmed because they are 1000 steps ahead of themselves. Click To Tweet

That’s exactly it. I’ll use this as a perfect example. I was up for my first call was 6:00 AM my time. I’m up at 5:00 to get ready and going. I was busy all the way through and got a break at 10:30 with my first break offline from doing trainings, interviews, and all the stuff. I went back to the bedroom. My wife was in there and she said, “You’re done with that call?” I said, “Yeah.” She says, “What’s next?” I said, “I now got a break, so I’m going to do some stuff.” She goes, “No, you look exhausted. Take half an hour and sleep.” I’m like, “No.” She goes, “Get in bed and have a sleep.” I set my alarm and I took a 30-minute nap because I knew I still had a lot I wanted to accomplish. That’s the key. If we don’t do it, we’re no different than your readers. 

Einstein and Edison were all big nappers. Those people who are known for accomplishing so much, they’re appreciating the value of where creativity comes from. We have to give ourselves that space to sleep, move, eat right, and those types of things matter in our brain function.  

I found it especially after my back surgeries because my back is still not on top. It’s been twelve years since I had my last back surgery and I’m off all medications, which I’ve been very diligent on, and making sure I stay in shape to never go through that again. There are days where I feel it knotting you. For me, the easiest way to relax my back is I go for a long walk. When I started doing that, I also noticed that’s when I started getting the most clarity.  

Great ideas come. I love doing that. 

I’m quieting my mind and all of a sudden, it’s like boom. I had to start making sure I had my cell phone with my notes so I could sit there if something hit me because you could say something and someone goes, “What did you say?” You’re like, “I don’t know.” 

You’re like, “I got to capture that.” 

I’ve learned to and one of the clues I love to give people is write it down. On my phone, I’ll either do a quick voice memo or I’ll put it onto my notes, so then I can let it go. Even that, why do people get overwhelmed? “I got to remember this,” and then they stress so much trying to remember it then they forget it anyway, “Why did I forget that?” 

They forget ten times more of other things because of all that. 

Take the song and change it. “Write it down, write it down.”  

It’s David Allen’s core song with getting things done. Let’s do this. I’d love to continue chatting. We could chat all day, but I want to bring the session to a close, ask you a couple of closing questions, and then I want to ask you where people can find out more about you. I always ask this question because I find it fascinating with different answers. What is your definition of productivity and why?  

People can be so busy but not productive. That was me. Now for me, productivity is I will carve out what I call focus time. I love that you’re the Focusologist. I found I can be way more productive in 1 to 2 hours of focus time than I am in 8 hours of regular, “I’ve got to get stuff done.” I utilize my calendar and I never used to. I live by my calendar now. The key thing I do is I make sure before I schedule anything else, I schedule in my balance pieces. The pampering time and the family time. All the things that regenerate who I am so that when I also know that, “Today is going to be busy day. I’ve got eighteen hours of calls, trainings, and work to do.” On those rare cases, that’s a long day like that. I can get it done. When I was traveling, I’d be on stage for twelve hours a day, 3 to 5 days straight. It allowed me to do that. 

When I’m off stage, I’d have half an hour. I learned this from one of my partners because he does everything on his computer. He sets his timer for 50 minutes. It doesn’t matter what he’s doing. The moment that timer goes off, he stops. He stands up, puts music on, dances around for a while, and then sits back down, resets his timer and goals. That’s how he stays focused. I started incorporating things like that into my life. I’ll purposely only schedule a maximum of two hours to focus on something before I have to change and go in a different energy and direction. I hope that answers your question. 

That can be different for everybody. Those time windows can be different. They could be shorter. Some people don’t have as long of an attention span to go two hours. It could be 30 minutes. It’s important for people to find where their sweet spot is. 

That’s why I said maximum of two hours because you’re exactly right. I usually go for 30 to 45 minutes. That’s a natural time for me that I found I get the most productive stuff done. 

 

Are there any cool apps that might support you? I’m not a huge app fan that I’ve got a ton of them, but I’ve got a couple that are so important to me. If you were to wipe off your phone, not including email or calendar, is there 1 or 2 that you would put on there that you’d say, “I use this daily to support working efficiently and effectively?”  

The one I use the most is called Calm. I use it because when I do my twenty-minute breaks to quiet my mind, I put it on in my earphones, listen to the sound of rain, just close my eyes, take some deep breaths, and come back to present. That’s number one. The number two is a conundrum on this one because I’m in the middle of getting version two ready. It’s my app called AmentorA. Version one, which we’ve taken offline now. The reason it’s absolute is because I built it for me. I create my vision boards on it, but I also put my success and gratitude journals on it. 

Every day I start my day with when I wake up, I write down the five things from the day before that I’m thankful for and/or grateful for. That can include people as well and my successes for the day. Because I like to write it down, I decided to create an app that had that integrated as well. That’s going to be the other app that will not come off my phone because I’ll be using it again daily once we get the second version up. 

I’m a journal person. I’ve been practicing that for many years. Every day, I’m writing down my gratitude because the more you focus on it, the more it grows. Even in the most difficult and trying times, it helps you to recenter yourself and be grounded, present, and focused on what’s good versus always filling yourself with what’s not. I’m a huge believer in that as well. 

I have a big practice that I started doing since the pandemic and I encourage my students to do. The worst thing they could have called it was social distancing. Physical distancing to keep safe, but now we need to be social. I share with my students and I did this myself. I will reach out to three people randomly a day to ask three words, “How are you?” Just to check in with them. It’s amazing how many people I get responses going, “I needed you to touch base with me and ask me that,” because we don’t know what’s going on in other people’s lives. We get so caught up in ours. 

Research has proven one of the quickest ways to get out of a depression is to help other people. By taking the focus off you and putting it on others, “How are you?” All of a sudden, now it activates that. It becomes beautiful. It helps you and it helps them. It’s a great way. One of the biggest blessings of this whole thing that’s going on in the world is I’ve had deeper connections with friends and family that I haven’t had connections with within years because I’ve been too busy. Having these conversations and connections has dropped my overwhelm, if that makes sense. 

Tell people how they can get a hold of your bestselling book and connect with you personally. 

Facebook, on my fan page, is the easiest way to stay connected with me. My virtual assistant says I’m now going to be on LinkedIn and Instagram as well. We’re getting all that set up but I would love as a gift for your readers to be able to download the eBook version of my international bestselling book, Success Left A Clue. They can go to RobertRiopel.com to get that and they will be able to download it as our gift to them. I am going to want them is not a book that you read. It’s six steps laid out in the book. The third step to creating the life you absolutely love is taking action. Throughout the book, I have action steps and I’ll even say when they start reading again, “Did you do the last action? If not, stop reading now, go back, and complete the action before you read.” I want them to understand that action is how they get through overwhelm and how they develop the life that they truly want. It’s an actual workbook, not just a book to read. 

Thank you so much. I’ve enjoyed chatting with you. I know that the readers have taken away a couple of nuggets that they can put into practice right away. Right now, they can take action. According to your action formula, they can be action figures. 

My pleasure. Thank you, Penny. 

We’re all the same. It’s our mindsets that put us in different positions. Click To Tweet

You guys who are reading, thank you for being here. I do encourage you after every one of these shows to walk away with one action that you’re going to take. I’m also very action-oriented. I believe that taking that action that’s going to help you through your challenges, build your business, improve your relationships, and further and advance your health. Whatever area is, you’ve got to take action to make it happen. Do subscribe to the show. Make sure that you’re following so that you know when the next show is coming on because I really look for great guests that are going to provide these actionable, valuable tips for you. See you in the next episode. 

Important Links:

• Robert Riopel 
• Calm 
• AmentorA 
• Facebook – Robert Riopel Fan Page 
• LinkedIn – Robert Riopel Fan Page 
• Success Left A Clue 
• https://Amzn.to/3gl2TbU 

About Robert Riopel

Robert Raymond Riopel is an International Best-Selling author, App Designer, Entrepreneur, and Trainer who has spent the past 18+ years traveling around the world sharing his passion. He has also shared the stage with and trained many of the top trainers and thought leaders in the world today.

With his high energy and heartfelt style, Robert draws on his journey from humble beginnings to financial freedom at the age of 32, to inspire individuals into tapping into their greatness. Realizing that he is not the only person that struggles, Robert’s “Clues” open individuals up to the possibilities that lie within them.

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